I can't believe we've never made sushi before

With only one of us having ever rolled sushi, we set off on the adventure early this evening.

We decided to make salmon and yellowfin tuna rolls - but learned a few things on the way. First thing's first - FISH IS EXPENSIVE. And finding sushi-grade fish is even worse, and probably more expensive - so lesson number 1, don't complain about how expensive sushi is at your favorite sushi joint. Lesson number 2, however, is that you can make delicious sushi with cooked fish at home - which is just what we did (instead of hunting for sushi-grade fish). Thanks for not being as cool as we thought you were, Whole Foods.

Ingredients:
Bamboo sushi rolling mats
1 cup Sushi rice, prepared (see below)
2 ounces each of salmon and tuna (or your choice of fish), seared 
1 package nori (seaweed) made for sushi rolling
Whatever you want in your sushi roll

We chose:
Mango (1/2 champagne mango, julienned)
Cucumber (1/2 small cucumber, julienned)
Avocado (1/2 avocado, julienned)... yes, there's a pattern here
Scallions (1 onion, julienned)

Sushi rice:
1 cup sushi rice
1.5 cup water
1/4 cup rice wine vinegar (we used apple cider vinegar and recommend using less if you use a stronger vinegar)
1/2 tbsp vegetable oil
1/8 cup white sugar
1/2 tsp salt

This will all make you 6 rolls, 6 pcs each

Directions:
Make the rice first. Rinse the rice in a strainer or colander until the water runs clear. Combine with water in a medium saucepan. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to low, cover and cook for 20 minutes. Rice should be tender and water should be absorbed. Cool until cool enough to handle.

In a small saucepan, combine the vinegar, oil, sugar and salt. Cook over medium heat until the sugar dissolves (about a minute or two). Stir into the cooked rice. Keep stirring and the rice will dry as it cools. Set rice aside to cool. Don't roll your sushi until your rice is room temperature.

(Rice directions from allrecipes.com/recipe/perfect-sushi-rice/)

If you're fancy and have raw, sushi-grade fish, you can slice it into the thickness of about your index finger and start rollin.

If not, however, sear your fish for just about 2 or 3 minutes on high heat, until it's cooked through and then slice it (or let it fall apart and use the small pieces to roll).

Now you're ready to roll your maki.

Set sushi rolling mat in front of you on a flat surface. Put a sheet of seaweed, shiny side down, on the mat. Take about 2 tablespoons of your sticky rice and with fingers dipped in water and vinegar solution, spread it out over the bottom half of your seaweed (the half closer to you). Make sure it's not too thick and as evenly distributed as possible.

Put a row of fish and filling on top of the rice, a little bit away from the edge (so you have some seaweed to grab onto when you start rolling). You can double or triple layer ingredients, but too much won't roll as easily.

Take your thumb and index finger and grab onto the mat that's closest to your body, while with the rest of your fingers, holding onto the filling (stuff in your roll). Holding the filling, curl your fingers over and start rolling the mat until the seaweed at the edge closest to you touches seaweed on the mat. Remove fingers from seaweed and tuck one hand over the mat to "tuck your seaweed in" while holding on to the far end of the mat so it doesn't move. Release your grip, roll the mat some more, and repeat motion, tucking it in as you go until you reach the end and your seaweed is all rolled up!

Take a serrated knife and cut into pieces - dip in soy sauce and ENJOY!

We also added sesame seeds and panko (tiny bread crumbs) for crunch for the inside of our rolls.

Rolling takes a lot of practice but if you make your rice correctly it will be super-sticky and none will end up in your soy sauce bowl (our accomplishment for the evening). 

Zucchini, Portabella, Chickpeas and Feta

Apologies for the somewhat blurry photos, which hardly do justice to the symphony of flavors that came together in our stomachs this evening.

Instead of picking and choosing, we decided to favor ambition and make three dishes - stuffed portabella mushrooms, zucchini patty sandwiches, and Grandma's blintzes with cherry pie filling.

The result was, well, you can't go wrong with portabella, zucchini, chickpeas and feta.

Stuffed Portabella Mushrooms (with our modifications)

Ingredients:
2 large Portobello mushrooms
1.5 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 tablespoon lemon juice
1 large garlic clove, finely chopped
Salt and pepper
1/4 cup cubed feta (note: the original recipe called for goat cheese, but we used feta)
1 recipe of oven roasted tomatoes*
Note: the original recipes called for 1 tablespoon fresh chopped parsley and 1 tablespoons fresh chopped chives but we went without either and didn't miss it.

*For oven roasted tomatoes:
Half a pint of cherry tomatoes. Mix with a tablespoon of olive oil. Sprinkle with either fresh or - like we did - dried thyme and basil. Slice 3 garlic cloves and them to tomatoes. Salt and pepper (just a sprinkle of each). Bake at 375, preferably in a dish that will collect all the juices and roast the tomatoes in their own juices, for 20-25 minutes or until they start wrinkling a little bit.

Directions:
1. Take out the mushroom stems and scrape out each mushroom's "gills" with a teaspoon, carefully, so you don't crack the portabella itself.
2. Mix olive oil, lemon juice, and garlic and cover portabellas with it on all sides (use up the whole thing)
3. Broil the mushrooms on a baking sheet for 3-5 minutes (in an oven) until they start releasing juices
4. Take em out, and fill to the top with roasted tomatoes and chunks of feta
5. Stick in the oven on 375 for about 10 minutes (or less, if mushrooms start looking ready)

Voila! You have stuffed portabellas that are ridiculously delicious.
Original recipe at http://afoodcentriclife.com/stuffed-portobello-mushrooms-with-roast-tomatoes-and-goat-cheese/

Zucchini and Chickpea Patty Sandwiches

Ingredients:
1 15.5-oz can chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 cup plain breadcrumbs
1 zucchini, grated
1 small red onion, grated
1 egg, lightly whisked
1 teaspoon coarse salt
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
4 whole-wheat pitas, toasted
1 cup low-fat Greek yogurt
Some lettuce or mixed greens

Directions:
1. Mash chickpeas in a bowl until smooth. Stir in breadcrumbs, zucchini, onion, egg, and salt. Form into 4-by-1/2-inch patties.
2. Saute patties in oil until golden and crisp, 2 to 3 minutes per side. USE A NONSTICK PAN - it makes all the difference!
3. Halve pitas and stuff with patties, yogurt, lettuce, and anything else that fancies you.

Note: we had to practically broil these in oil and many fell apart. Next time, we're going to try adding a second egg and a tablespoon or so of flour, in the hopes of reducing the amount of oil and keeping the patties together better.

 And last but  not least...

Someone's Grandma's Russian Blintzes

While Sonya has attempted to make HER Grandma's blintzes for ages, they never quite presented the nostalgia and similarity to her Grandma's kitchen that this recipe yielded.

Ingredients:

3 eggs
1/2 cup flour
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon sugar
1 pinch salt
2 tablespoons oil

Directions:

1. Mix all the ingredients together. Leave the flower for last, as you will need to fold it in and then mix the batter until it is completely, read, completely! clump free. The measure of an excellent blintze is the smoothness and lightness of its batter.

2. Heat non-stick skillet and using one standard soup ladle per blintze, pour out each blintze onto the skillet as evenly as possible, cooking just long enough on each side for it to turn golden.

3. Eat with any filling your heart desires - we experimented with cherry pie filling out of a can (also heated in the microwave) and some left-over yogurt but recommend any sort of fruit jam/preserves, cheese, mashed potatoes, and the list can go on.

All in all, some serious grating, chopping, frying, and baking went down.

You CAN cook from Pinterest

I'll admit that the actual recipes we used did not come from Pinterest, but the images we salivated from did and that led us on a scavenger hunt for the original recipes which would make the beautiful things we were looking at on the screen.

For anyone who wants to trace the blog, these came from Punchfork - but the actual recipes lives at www.simplyrecipes.com and www.lovefood.com (respectively).

And so, tonight's adventure included Caprese Corn Salad and Roasted Vegetable Couscous (we threw in some garlic bread, fried plantains, and plain steamed corn as well, to fill out the dinner plate).

Please note, we modified both moderately.

Caprese Corn Salad (and you thought you've had good caprese salad!)

Ingredients (our measurements):
2 ears worth of raw sweet white corn kernels
2ish cups cherry tomatoes, cut in halves
1/2 cup scallions, chopped
8 ounces (1 package) of fresh mozzarella, cubed
1/2 cup fresh basil leaves, chopped (could go with less, it's a pretty dominant flavor)

Dressing:
1/4 cup olive oil
3 tbs sherry vinegar or white wine vinegar
1/2 tsp sugar
Some salt and pepper (to taste)

Directions:
Cut em all up and whisk together salad dressing (in separate dish), then pour it all in and mix well.

Seriously, so delicious with the crunch of  the corn and the smoothness of the mozzarella and the acidity of the tomatoes, we just about swallowed the bowl whole.

Roasted Vegetable Couscous

Ingredients (our version, based pretty much on the recipe but with a few omissions):
1 red bell pepper, finely chopped
1 butternut squash, peeled and finely chopped
1 red onion, chopped (not as finely as the rest, it will cook down)
4-5 cloves of garlic, chopped
2 tbs thyme (we used dried)
2 tbs zatar seasoning (this was our addition - if you don't know this spice, look it up, it will change your world!)
2-4 tbs olive oil
1 package couscous (we used the quick-cook kind with its own spice packet and followed directions on the box)
Some salt and pepper (to taste)

Directions:
Chop all vegetables, put in big bowl, and mix with garlic, salt and pepper, olive oil, zatar and thyme. Mix well so everything is coated. Spread on cookie sheet (we covered ours in foil) and cook until vegetables are well roasted (browned at the edges) on about 375. Make sure to stir them often so they don't stick and burn.

Separately, follow directions for cooking couscous. When both are done, mix vegetables and couscous together in large bowl. We added an extra tbs. of olive oil for good measure.

As sides, we cooked some corn (steamed), some garlic bread out of a box (gasp, I know, the travesty), which added a really nice flavor to everything, and friend some sweet plantains in regular vegetable oil (sprinkle with sugar, salt, or both after frying them until they are a golden brown).

The Caprese Corn Salad and Couscous were AWESOME and now I have a super-easy recipe for super-great and SUPER-easy roasted vegetables!

Easy as Pie

No, really. This strawberry pie really was super-easy.

If you ever find yourself with too many strawberries (there is such a thing as too many strawberries), this is a great recipe with very few ingredients (especially if you cheat like us!).

Ingredients:
1 (9 inch) pie (baked) - we used a store-bought graham cracker crust
4 cups (or a bit more) of strawberries, sliced pretty thinly (we probably used at least 5 cups)
3/4 cup white sugar
3 tbs corn starch
1/2 cup water
a few graham crackers, smashed

Directions:
Wash, core and slice strawberries
1 cup set aside and mash
Line the crust with the other 3 (or so) cups of fresh strawberries

In medium saucepan, combine sugar, strawberries, corn starch and water and cook over medium heat, mixing CONSTANTLY. This is very important - if you slack, your mixture will stick to your pan like gum to a shoe. Cook for 4-5 minutes, until mixture gets very thick and jello-y. Let mixture cool a bit (until it's not steaming actively).

Pour your thickened mixture over fresh berries in the crust and spread evenly. Stick it in the fridge uncovered for one hour.

After an hour, the pie should be set. Sprinkle the top with crushed graham cracker and serve!

Please note this is a combined recipe from allrecipes.com and bakers who commented on the website with their own tips. The sprinkled graham crackers was our personal addition to this recipe :)

New Cookbook, New Inspiration

Tonight we took a trip to Turkey to eat some (fake) beef and savor the juices and flavors of eggplant with excellent linguine-in-lemon-zest as a side.

Dish number one was called Turkish Eggplant and went like this:
(Original recipe in "The Little Big Mediterranean Book" by McRae Books)

Ingredients: (please note, original recipe calls for 3 eggplant but we cut the recipe down to a third)

1 large eggplant
1 large onion
2 medium-size tomatoes
salt and pepper
olive or vegetable oil
1 lb minced beef (we used Morning Star crumbles... the veg way to go)
1 cup stewed canned tomatoes - with Italian seasoning (substituting another full fresh tomato)
Some dry parsley and pinch of garlic powder

Directions:

Don't do like we did and follow each step carefully.
1. Cut eggplant in half. Make long, deep lengthwise cuts in each half of the eggplant. Sprinkle generously with salt and let eggplant sit in colander for an hour to drain juice.
2. In the meantime.... finely chop onion and saute in preferably olive oil until golden and translucent with a pinch of salt
3. Add in about 3/4th of a pound bag of Morning Star crumbles and cook until the fake meat isn't cold anymore
4. Chop 1 of your fresh tomatoes and throw it into the meat mixture with the canned tomato (you can certainly use all fresh tomatoes if you prefer), a pinch of black pepper, a teaspoon or a bit more of dried parsley, and a teaspoon of garlic powder
5. Simmer, covered, until tomatoes are thoroughly cooked; set aside
6. In the meantime, your eggplant should be just about dehydrated and ready to fry; RINSE OFF THE SALT (this is very important), dry it off, and fry eggplant open-face down under a lid until it goes soft but not quite mushy. Turn the eggplant over as necessary so that it's cooked both on the top and bottom and add oil as you go, since anyone who's ever fried an eggplant knows those things suck up oil like nobody's business. Should take you at least 10-12 minutes to cook eggplant sufficiently.
7. When eggplant is thoroughly fried and soft, take a teaspoon and spoon your meat mixture into and onto the soft eggplant. The long slits you made in the beginning should allow for ample mixture to fit in and on the eggplant halves
8. Remember that other fresh tomato? Slice it into thin, pretty slices and cover each stuffed eggplant half with these slices
9. Sprinkle the top of each eggplant with some dry (or fresh, if you've got it) parsley for taste and presentation
10. Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees and bake stuffed eggplant for 15 to 20 minutes or until the fresh tomatoes on top start to wilt

** The original recipe called for a cup of water to be added to the stuffed eggplant pan before baking (to keep from drying) but we didn't think it was necessary and our eggplant released at least that much juice on its own**

Dish number two was a lemon-zesty pasta
(Original recipe in "The Fruit Cookbook" by Nicole Ruthier)

Ingredients:

1 lime
1 lemon
1 c heavy whipping cream
1 lb linguine
1 T brown mustard
1 1/2 T tapioca (cook-quick)
salt/pepper

Directions:

1. Zest both lemon and lime and chop zest finely.
2. Peel and de-pith your lemon and lime. Then section out the fruit leaving out any seeds.
3. Bring to a boil in a saute pan, add the zest, fruit sections, mustard, cream, and tapioca.
4. Stir often.
5. Separately, boil salted water and cook pasta al dente.
6. Once pasta is al dente add to sauce and mix. Eat this up.

A Night of Crossing International Cooking Borders

Today was a truly epic adventure of olive oil, butter, and vegetable oil so if oil ain't your thing, this is probably not the blog post for you.

On the menu we have:
Spanakopita
Chick pea salad
Zatar potatoes
Tostones with mojito dip (fried plantains with green sauce)

Everything but the spanakopita is a cinch but man is it worth it when the filo dough is perfectly crispy an dripping in butter... maybe I'll go steal some more!

Spanakopita:

Stuffing ingredients:
20 ounces of chopped frozen spinach thawed and drained
4 large shallots, minced (any sweeter, lighter spring onion will probably do)
3/4 cup chopped fresh parsley (no, this won't work with the dry stuff)
8 ounces of crumbled feta
2 eggs
1/4 tsp salt
1/8 tsp pepper

Wrapping:
Store-bought filo dough
1 stick of butter, melted

Cooking instructions:
Make the stuffing first by sauteing the chopped shallots, parsley, salt and pepper in olive oil for 3-5 minutes. Add the above to thawed (and drained) spinach in a bowl. Add feta and eggs, mix well.

Assembly instructions:
Peel off a filo dough sheet and place on flat surface. Lightly cover the surface with melted butter (a pastry brush would have been SO helpful here). Fold the dough over on itself (butter should meet butter); at one end of the pastry sheet, put a table spoon (or a bit  more if you like them more stuffed) of stuffing. Fold into triangle (if you need help, check out the interwebs). Brush both sides of the triangle with butter and put on shallow, ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 25ish minutes on 350 degrees. Check to make sure the filo dough isn't getting too brown - it should come out a beautiful golden color.

Chickpea salad:

Ingredients:
Can of chickpeas
Half an English cucumber (yes, it must be extra-crunchy)
2 good-sized plum tomatoes (or tomatoes of your choice) - I took the guts out to make them less slimy
1/2 cup red onion
1/2 cup (or more if you like) crumbled feta
2 tbsps olive oil
1 tbsp red wine vinegar
Salt, black pepper, red pepper flakes, and a bit of dill (our substitute for not having rosemary) to taste

Cooking instructions:
Chop everything up and mix it all around!

Zatar potatoes:

Ingredients:
Any kind of potato you wish, cut into wedges (if the potato skin is rough, peel it, if it's tender, leave it on)
1 cup olive oil
2 tbsp zatar seasoning (comes from the Middle East, super awesome)
1 tbsp garlic powder
Some salt
Some pepper

Cooking instructions:
Take large bowl and mix together olive oil, zatar, garlic powder, salt and pepper. Plop potato wedges and with your bare hands (spoons don't work as well, trust us), mix everything together so that the potatoes are completely coated. Bake on semi-shallow baking sheet, 350 degrees, till potatoes are appropriately soft or crunchy to your liking (we like them crunchier so we kept them in about 45 minutes). It's VERY important to mix the potatoes around every 10 or so minutes so they are cooking equally on all sides.

And last but not least.... the Tostones!

So here's the deal. Tostones are really easy to make but it's kind of a process so get ready for process.

Ingredients:
Green plantains (4 plantains will make a full, large plate, double-layered)
Vegetable oil
Salt, pepper, garlic powder

Mojito dipping sauce ingredients (or what we used anyway)
Half a good-sized bunch of cilantro
1 head of garlic
2 tbsps lemon juice (can up or decrease the lemon juice depending on how much you like it)
1 cup olive oil
Some salt and pepper

Tostone preparation instructions:
Heat about an inch of vegetable oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Slice peeled plantains into inch-thick slices and fry them until they are very golden-brown and soft, for 5 to 10 minutes. Remove from the oil and drain on paper towels. You can use a fancy thing called a tostonera (a press) to slightly mash each piece until it is about 1/2 inch thick, or, if you're not fancy like us, you can just use the back of a saucer or small plate and mash away (they smush just as well). Press all of the pieces before going onto the next step. When you have all your plantain pieces in thin, smashed form, return them to the hot skillet and fry until crispy, about 3 minutes per side. Drain on paper towels and season with garlic powder and salt while still warm.

Instructions for the magical, you'll-never-forget-it mojito dipping sauce:

Plop all ingredients into a blender and blend away until you have a smooth mixture (aka dipping sauce). Taste it and add salt, lemon juice, or more cilantro to your liking.  Mmmmmmmm then dip EVERYTHING into it for the rest of the evening including the potatoes and anything else you might dip into a magical green sauce!

That's all folks, until next time...

And Finally There Was Curry

For as long as we've been cooking together, which is now almost three years(!), we've talked about making curry. From scratch of course. We would be mixing spices for a Mediterannean dish, or some cumin would sneak into another recipe, and we'd say "mmm.... we should really make curry one day".

Well ladies and gentlemen - that day has finally come. We made curry. The only thing to note about making curry at home is that it's a commitment. If you're like me and cook with garlic, salt, and black pepper, you're going to have to go on quite the spice scavenger hunt - but believe me, it's worth it.

Main Ingredients:
4 medium white potatoes, cubed
1 green bell pepper, cubed
2 medium or 4 small zuchinni, cubed
2 smaller onion, chopped into chunks
4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 cup (or more, if you really like them) canned chickpeas
1 can coconut milk
2 cups vegetable broth
2 tbsp "minute" tapioca to thicken (optional)
1 package extra-firm tofu (optional)

Spices:
1 tsp paprika
3 tbsp curry powder
1 stick of cinnamon (optional)
1 tsp ground cinnamon
2 bay leaves
1/2 tsp ground fresh ginger (optional)
1/4 tsp dry ginger
1 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp tomato paste
1 tbsp lemon or lime juice
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp fresh lemongrass finely chopped (can probably substitute with 1 tbsp dry lemongrass, but we're not vouching for it)
2 fresh lemongrass stocks about 2 inches long (optional)

Directions:
Boil potatoes until they get just soft enough to stick a fork in (not too soft, they'll fall apart later). Set aside. In the same deep pot, heat some oil and saute onions and garlic until they start getting browned. Add a little vegetable broth to help cook them. Push onions to the sides of the pan, creating a round space in the middle of the pot. Pour a tbsp of olive oil in the middle and add all spices. Stir all the ingredients together with onion/garlic and bloom the spices with the garlic.

Add the pepper, zucchini, chick peas, potatoes, veg stock and coconut milk and let the mixture cook for about half hour. Don't let it boil too hard or the vegetables will overcook. If you like, fry some tofu in a seperate pan (or some chicken for that matter, but we used tofu) and add to your curry towards the end. Because we added more vegetable stock than we should have, we thickened our curry with tapioca. To do that, pour some of the curry liquid into a seperate cup with 2 tbsp of "instant" tapioca and stir until it's all dissolved, then dump into your curry.

Tips:
If you don't want tapioca in your curry :) (although you can't taste it at all) use less vegetable stock. Also, the level of spicyness is completely in your hands so use more or less of the cayenne pepper to your taste. Serve over whatever you like - we used instant rice (5 minutes and it's ready baby) - you can also use "real" rice.

To use tofu, slice it into sheets and let drain under pressure for at least half hour. Then, cut into cubes and fry in at least a half-inch of vegetable oil. Leave tofu until it's a nice golden brown, then turn over to cook the other side. Tofu should be mostly if not all the way cooked before being dumped into your curry.

For chicken cooking tips, see different blog.