It was a great ride.
The NBA Playoffs are prematurely over for me now, but I am not disappointed. I am beaming with pride at how hard the Phoenix Suns and the Golden State Warriors played this season. I am heartened by their staggering efforts, the sincere collegiality they share with their teammates and with the entire NBA, and their abiding spirit of competitiveness.
I was on the edge of my seat in anticipation for every adrenaline-filled minute of every game.
The Golden State Warriors exceeded everyone’s expectations. And the Phoenix Suns always friggin’ incredible. They came together in the face of adversity and put up a great fight, even when the odds were clearly stacked against them.
Okay, enough @$$-kissing on my end. In celebration of the efforts of these NBA players, and for those of you who will continue to watch the Playoffs, I want to share with you a delectable game day recipe that will be sure to get your trash-talkin’ vocal cords all geared up.
Pita Wedges Topped with Warm Goat Cheese and Roasted Squash
2 medium rounds of pita bread
1/2 bulbous squash (or 3 slender squashes, such as zucchini), sliced thinly
1/2 onion bulb, sliced thinly, and separated into rings (red onion adds more color)
5 tbsp of pesto (or 4 tbsp of freshly grated parmesan cheese and 1 tbsp of fresh thyme)
1/2 of an 11-oz pkg of chevre (goat cheese)
First, preheat an oven to 400 degrees. With a paper towel lightly dampened with vegetable oil, wipe down the surface of a cookie sheet. Lay the two rounds of pita bread on the cookie sheet. Next, layer the pita rounds evenly with the thin slices of squash and rings of onion. You do not want to overwhelm the pita bread by adding so many ingredients so that the ultimate pita pie will be soggy, so only lay one layer of squash on top of the bread. Add the chevre and pesto next. Rather than directly smearing pesto onto the pita bread, add it onto the squash slices in clumps. Adding the pesto visibly on top of the squash slices (as opposed to burying the pesto underneath of the other toppings) adds an appealing dimension of color to the pita pie. I usually freeze leftover pesto, so when I want to make these pita wedges, I just break the frozen pesto apart into rough chunks and scatter the pieces over the pita bread. When the pita wedges are finished cooking, I spread the warmed pesto over the surface of the pie and the exposed slices of squash.
Next, firmly clutch a spoon in between your fingers and shovel out moist clumps of goat cheese from the package onto the pita bread. Twist your wrist as you spoon out the cheese from the plastic package. "Twisting" your wrist helps to separate the goat cheese into relatively uniform morsels and prevents the chevre from sticking to the spoon.
When the toppings are evenly distributed, put the pita pies on the top rack in the oven, and let the pies heat for about 10 to 15 minutes. Make sure that the bottom of the pita bread does not burn. When you remove the pita pie from the oven, test the pita bread quickly with your finger to make sure it is crispy, otherwise, you might have to put it in the oven for a few more minutes. You can also leave the pita pie in the oven longer so that the squash and onions obtain a nice "roasted" look during the cooking process.
If you have leftover slices of squash, you can store them in a Ziploc bag for use later or cut them into triangles and serve them with 1) marinated artichokes or 2) spongy mozzarella balls that have been marinated in extra virgin olive oil and an aromatic blend of Italian spices. These tiny squash snacks perfectly compliment the roasted pita wedges.
I hope these pita snacks give you a burst of energy to cheer for your favorite team! Go fill-in-the-blank-team!
Dear Food Blogging Friend,
I owe you an explanation.
I need the patch, except not the patch for nicotine, but for something infinitely more addictive: television.
I can't stop watching the NBA playoffs or the after-show or the sports segment in the 11:00 o'clock news. I can't stop reading sports columns. I can't stop listening to sports radio. There isn't a minute that goes by that I am not thinking, breathing, dreaming about the Phoenix Suns, and it has gotten even worse since the latest fiasco.
But it isn't you. Seriously, it's me. Just look at the innards of my fridge and you'll see for yourself. See what I've been eating? Condiments and drinks. I have also been eating cans of cold ravioli and cereal. . . Without milk.
The purpose of this post is to promise you that I will back to my food blogging self in a few weeks, which means I'll be leaving extensive comments and posting again! Okay, back to tonight's Spurs vs. Suns game! See you friends soon.
Sorry I have been so quiet lately. . . I have been a little too addicted to the NBA Playoffs this month. But it is almost over!
However, my lack of recent posts mean that there is a huge backlog of photos and half-written posts, languishing in Blogger, and not yet ready to be finalized and published.
You can imagine my delight when a fellow food blogging friend, Eat, Drink, and Be Merry posted about a place I've been meaning to post about for over seven months: Shik Do Rak. (I've heard that Shik Do Rak means something like "the hungry esophagus" in Korean. (But don't blindly trust my translation, because I heard it from a Caucasian guy!)
Now that Eat, Drink, and Be Merry posted about this Korean Barbecue restaurant in Los Angeles' Koreatown, I thought I'd piggy-back on his post, by posting a few pictures and encouraging you to try this tasty Los Angeles-area eatery where you can chargrill your own red meat, onions, and halved button mushrooms on a circular Korean-style grill.
If you've never been to have Korean barbecue before, it entails a lot of cooking on your end. Your server will bring you out a tray of various marinated or non-marinated red meats, and you may grill them on your sizzling table grill to your liking. Remember, when manning the grill, be sure to move the cooked pieces of meat to a specified, cooler area of the grill (and away from the uncooked meat) to prevent cross-contamination.
Just as Eat, Drink, and Be Merry suggests in his post, Shik Do Rak offers thin, flat sheets of rice paper noodle that you use to wrap the grilled meat and leafy greens before chowing down.
Also, use the flavored oils and hot chili sauce to taste.
As you eat your rice paper wraps, don't forget to eat your fill of their selection of pickled, salted, and fermented vegetables, called panchan. For those of you who are unfamiliar with panchan, it generally consists of such items as pickled bean sprouts, cucumbers, seaweed, and fermented napa cabbage (kimchee). Panchan has an acerbic crunch and a pleasant vinegary bitterness. I call them "chopstick foods"--as opposed to "finger foods"--because the elements are easily pinched between the tapered ends of a pair of lengthened and slender chopsticks.
And, Shik Do Rak also offers a satisfying spicy tofu soup to close your barbecued meal. The soup is made with clams and red Korean chili pepper powder, and is called soondubu.
I hope this brief post gave you a nice orientation on Korean barbecue (if you were previously unacquainted with it)! Korean barbecue is very fun: it is as elaborate as a Broadway production because it comes replete with 1) sizzling, spitting, and glowing grill grates and 2) smoke which continuously emanates from the grill. Best of all, Korean barbecue restaurants are great places to take a large group of friends, especially friends who are collaborative, ambitious people who take charge at social events--or if those friends merely like to barbecue meat!
I'd like to introduce you to a friend of mine, the lotus root. He is a little bashful (many people think he looks bizarre), but once you get to know him, I think you'll be making regular dinner plans with him! (In my "personification" of the lotus root, I will refer to it as "him" because I like assigning vegetables the male gender and fruits the female gender!)
The lotus root has an interestingly crisp and fibrous texture. When lotus root is cooked, it is not mushy or soft as it might appear. If you've never tried lotus root, the best textural analogy I can conjure up for you is that it feels like you are eating partially-cooked daikon, slices of raw jicama, or a coarse and flavorless Asian pear. Except, lotus root feels as if it has developed stringy fibers that are interwoven throughout the trunk of the root. Even when cooked, lotus root still has a raw celery-type crispness to it.
The flavor of lotus root is equally unique. But, for lack of a better analogy, I would say that lotus root shares the same subdued nuttiness that one finds in daikon. Others have compared the flavors of lotus root to water chestnuts.
The wonderful thing about lotus root, is that it has absorptive qualities that make it the tofu of the vegetable world. Lotus root takes on the characteristics of the sauces in which the it is cooked. The symmetrical holes in the root are the perfect repositories for storing little beads of sauce that are held together by surface tension.
I hope one look at this vegetable equivalent of Swiss cheese will pique your interest in learning how to cook it. You can eat it raw, in soups, and in stir-fries. Just peel off its skin and remove the knobby ends. Then slice the lotus root into thin wheels and cook it in anyway you please. For easier cooking, you can also purchase it canned!
Give me a chalupa* because Golden State Warriors just won against the top-seeded Dallas Mavericks, 111-86!!
111-86. The most beautiful sounding numbers on the planet this moment.
Tonight's game shouldn't be called the "greatest upset in NBA history," because there isn't anyone in the Bay Area who is upset right now! Rather, it should be called the "most long-awaited and deserved victory!"
*Golden State Warriors used to give everyone in the stadium free chalupas if the Warriors scored over 100 in a given game. With Baron Davis and Stephen Jackson, the Golden State Warriors are going to be giving out a whole lotta of chalupas!
This week has been an extraordinarily hectic one. I haven't been posting (or even checking my favorite food sites) lately because of a Mediterranean party the beau and I have been planning and eventually threw yesterday night for group of close friends. The event involved a significant amount of prep work and shopping, but what made the party difficult, is that I had to simultaneously make time for my biggest annual commitment: the NBA Playoffs with the Phoenix Suns. When I watch Suns games, I get "in the zone," and all else in my life takes second place--including cooking and eating. To me, Suns games are more important to me than imbibing my daily requirement of water or consuming life-sustaining nutrients. Yes, I said that correctly: Suns games are more important to me than food.
But, now that I have a brief period of off time (Game 4 just ended), I want to make some time for my other commitment, my friends here at the food blog! I want to share with you some pictures I was able to take of the food at the party. Unfortunately, because I spent huge portions of my pre-party time watching Friday's game, I wasn't able to take as many pictures as I usually do, but here are some of the tastier pictures I was able to snap.
The most difficult and labor-intensive item that I made for Saturday's party was the dolmades. Dolmades are made with thin blankets of veined grape leaves, which are carefully bundled around moist filling made with steamed long grain rice. The rice filling is festooned with specks of coarsely minced mint; sweet, plump, and flavor-saturated raisins; crunchy pine nuts; and a savory blend of steaming and caramelized onions and garlic. For the full recipe, check here. For a step-by-step pictorial on how to assemble dolmades, see the pictures below:
The dolmades went perfectly with tzatziki, a cooling dairy-based salsa made with thick, Greek yogurt. Tzatziki is infused with the zesty and taste bud-penetrating flavors of mint and mixed with suspended, gravity-defying diced cucumber cubes. Tzatziki should be made ahead of time, to allow the flavors to imbue themselves throughout the creamy yogurt concoction.
Also, for the party, I prepared my favorite refreshing Mediterranean salad, tabbouleh, made with a coarsely minced herb blend of flat-leaf parsley, mint, and green scallions. The salad is dressed with fruity extra virgin olive oil, lemon juice, and lemon zest and interspersed with crumbly and absorbent kernels of coarsely milled bulghur wheat. This too should be made ahead of time, again, to allow the mixture of the flavors.
Along with the above pictured items, the party meal featured southern-cooked spinach and poached asparagus spears with lemon zest (which was cooked ahead of time, and unfortunately, not very photogenic), roasted chicken with lemon and rosemary (didn't have time take a nice picture of this) and commercially-made pita bread and hummus.
Okay, back to watching SportsCenter highlights and replays of the Phoenix Suns playoff game! You're welcome to come to San Francisco and watch with me, if you don't mind my trash talking!
Looking for a summery, refreshing, and unlaborious idea for dinner that can be finished in less than 20 minutes? Try this Vietnamese salad made with an ethereal dressing infused with the robust flavors of citrus, mint, and piquant chili pepper flakes. The simple yet sophisticated flavors from this salad will pirouette upon your tongue and open your palate's horizons to the multifaceted world of Vietnamese cuisine.
To make the nuoc cham salad dressing for the vermicelli bun salad, whisk 1/4 cup of high-quality fish sauce, 1/4 cup of granulated white sugar, 1/2 cup of water, one tsp of crushed red chili flakes (or one minced, deseeded, red Thai bird chili), and the juice from two limes. You may also add a bit of lime zest from the limes too. After the sugar has dissolved, add about five cloves of minced garlic and one carrot, shredded on the large holes of a box grater (not the small holes, as I did here). Adding the carrots into the dressing helps to soften them slightly and allows the carrots to absorb some of the flavor from the tangy and full-bodied marinade.
Meanwhile, bring a large pot of water to a rolling boil. Add a 10 oz package dry rice noodles, and boil the rice noodles until they are soft and pliable. Be careful not to overboil the noodles because they can quickly become mushy and disintegrate. Boil the noodles for less than 5 minutes, stirring the noodles periodically to prevent them from sticking together. Keep an eye on them. After five minutes or less, immediately drain the noodles in a colander, and rinse them under cold, running water. As you rinse the noodles, use your hands to swish the noodles around in the running tap water, so that the noodles will cool completely. Shake the colander over the drain to get rid of excess water and divide the noodles evenly into large bowls.
Wash, leaf, and tear 1/4 a head of iceberg lettuce into bite-sized pieces. For more uniformity, you may also shred the lettuce finely. Also peel and thinly slice one large cucumber and coarsely chop 1/2 cup of packed mint leaves. You may also choose to add a handful or two of fresh bean sprouts and several full sprigs cilantro if you'd like. Divide the chilled salad ingredients and organize the salad on top of the noodles.
Finally, portion out the nuoc cham dressing into small bowls, to allow each person to add his or her own dressing to his or her own liking. You may also sprinkle the salad with crushed and roasted peanuts.
Wasn't that easy? Now there is just one more step: serve the salad, and enjoy it! Also, for a great recipe with barbequed pork, check out Oishii Eat's site!
Looking for an uncomplicated way to enliven your monotonous brown bag lunches? Try this refined, bourgeois version of the ubiquitous grilled cheese sandwich.
Start with a freshly-baked loaf of herbed panini (focaccia) bread. Slice the bread into individual-sized sandwich servings. Then, use your fingers to evenly distribute crumbled gorgonzola cheese over the bottom slices of the bread.
Meanwhile, wash, core, and cut a red delicious apple into thin slices. You may also use fuji or gala apples or a bosc pear, but I'd advise against using Granny Smith apples because of their tartness. Of all the apple varieties, I like using red delicious apples the best because of the classic red color. Nestle the slices of red delicious apple into the gorgonzola crumbles.
Next, cover the sandwiches with the top half of the panini bread and place the sandwiches in a panini press or non-stick grill appliance, such as a George Foreman grill.
The sandwich should be heated on the medium setting of the grill for about five minutes or less, depending on the strength of the panini press or grill.
After five minutes, there should be parallel grill marks impressed into the surface of the bread and the melted cheese will be oozy and supple. The apples should have retained their crispness and will provide a delicate sweetness and freshness to the final grilled cheese sandwich.
This sandwich goes well with fresh fruits, such as juicy red strawberries and purple clusters of red grapes.
When I think of tea parties, I think of women dressed in outdoorsy, flapper ensembles sitting underneath spotless, wide-brimmed umbrellas. I think of starched linen tablecloths, tabletop wicker baskets brimming with freshly-baked scones, and ornate glass containers holding sugary fruit preserves. I think of pinkies saluting upward and long and tapered fingers delicately holding the handles of porcelain tea cups.
Recently, I was inspired by Wandering Chopsticks to throw my own tea party, because I wanted to sit back and relax from the hurried and vexing stresses of this week.
Similar to Wandering Chopsticks, I also made tea sandwiches for my party, but I added a uniquely Californian flair to the classic sandwiches. In doing so, I transformed a traditional, sophisticated tea sandwich into one worthy of the Mad Hatter. The images conjured up by my odd tea sandwich creation, were garish, gaudy, and clown-like, akin to the polka-dotted bow tie and purplish, elephantine top hat donned by Lewis Carroll's Mad Hatter.
I started with a soft loaf of multi-grain bread. Using a tea cup as a stencil, I cut into the bread with tip of my knife, tracing a circular cutout into the wholesome bread. Being as frugal as possible, I used the bread ends as well.
On the bread rounds, I smeared a gentle coat of freshly-pureed pesto.
Then, I sliced creamy avocados into thin crescent-shaped half moons and interlayered the slices on top of the bread rounds.
Next, I topped the sandwiches with crimson-colored beet slices,
And thin squares of chilled brie.
As I finished making the sandwiches, I couldn't help but to smile like the Cheshire cat at my odd creation. This tea sandwich was definitely worth of a Mad Tea Party!
It was a great ride.
