Ethnic Week

It's Ethnic Week in the Henry Household. What does that mean? Per my last post, "I've Been on Hiatus", I'm planning to make nothing but ethnic dishes this week in an effort to bring some new flavors to our palates and mix up the usual meals I've been making.


Now, "ethnic" is a loosely defined term in this context. Last night, I made Tequila-Lime Steak Fajitas, so we took a little trip to Mexico, complete with hand-shaken margaritas.

Forgive the poor photography, and somewhat unappealing appearance of the fajitas, but they were tasty! However, I have a bad habit of overcooking meat, especially on the stovetop. I am so paranoid about undercooking meat and getting sick from it (especially as I enjoy my steak cooked on the well side of medium-well) but this tends to result in steak the equivalent of tire tread.

There's the benefit of marinating, I suppose. This steak was marinated in tequila, lime juice, chopped onions, a bit of sugar, salt and pepper. I definitely think it helped lessen the toughness of the tires, I mean, fajitas, but still. I need to learn to properly cook steak on the stove. Any suggestions?


Ethnic Week continued much more successfully and less rubbery tonight with a trip to Asia, via America's influence on Sweet and Sour Chicken. Granted, this is the most American version of ethnic food imaginable, but it was still fantastic! I don't want to toot my own horn (too much) but the plated dish looked exactly like the one in the cookbook. Not too shabby for my first foray into Asian cooking. Not to mention, it was one of the more simple dishes I ever made.

All you do is coat your chicken pieces in egg white and corn starch and let that sit while you sautee your bell peppers. The recipe called for red and yellow peppers, but the store only had green and yellow today. So here we are:

In the meantime, I cooked a pot of rice to serve the final dish over. Once your peppers are sauteed (by the way, if you don't own a wok, invest in one immediately. Greatest. Tool. Ever.) you remove them from the heat, add the chicken and brown on both sides. Then add back in the peppers, a can of pineapple chunks and the sauce which is just ketchup, vinegar, brown sugar, salt, ginger and pineapple juice.

Mix, heat til the chicken is fully cooked and enjoy!

Tomorrow continues Ethnic Week. a la American-Style, with a Southwestern Chili. I haven't decided exactly which recipe to follow to truly include an ethnic twist, but I'll let you know how things turn out!

Cheers!

Maureen

I've been on hiatus

I think the title says it all - I've been on a cooking (and, therefore, blogging) hiatus the past few weeks. Between the doc working odd shifts this month, and the downtime from all the holiday celebrating, we've been taking the lazy way out and either going out, ordering out or not really eating dinner at all.

However, we took a lovely weekend trip to Temecula, a wine country area about 45 minutes north of us last weekend, and there is a blog post about all the fabulous wine (photos included!) to come shortly.

It was Restaurant Week in San Diego last week, so we took advantage of the great deals at a few of the places and tried out a seafood restaurant (pasta option for me, thankyouverymuch!) and a restaurant in Balboa Park that had a little of everything. My pasta at Harbor House was quite tasty - sun dried tomatoes, spinach and a cream sauce - while the doc got some kind of carribean-flavored shimp that he was not a big fan of. Prado was a big hit with both of us - I had a white truffle and mushroom risotto which is still making my mouth water as I think back on it, and the doc had a very tender and saucy short rib dish. Restaurant Week is such a great concept in any city, to let you try a new restaurant (or visit an old favorite) and try some of their signature dishes from a fixed menu for a less-than-usual price. I'm looking forward to the next one soon!

Outside of our Restaurant Week foray, we've ordered in pizza, gotten Chinese takout and headed out to a local watering hole to take advantage of their happy hour food specials. Lazy? Yes. Convenient (no dishes, no prep time, no menu planning, no grocery shopping required)? Also Yes.

However, we can't eat out like this forever, so we've been trying to get back on track with home-cooked meals. I'm really trying to make meals that are tasty, a bit different than the everyday fare we're used to, but also not super time-consuming or requiring a ton of ingredients.

So, the other night, we were lounging on the couch and I decided to make risotto. It's essentially rice, chicken broth and cheese, and you can dress it up with whatever you want. Super simple, yet so delicious. We made it a bit more interesting with some chicken, peas, carrots, garlic powder and coarse black pepper. It only took about 30 minutes to make and it is something that can be so versatile that I can serve it again soon, but with different ingredients to change up the flavor profile.

On the menu tonight is tequila-lime steak fajitas, and tomorrow is sweet and sour chicken. I'm thinking of making ethnic dishes all this week to utilize some of the recipes I've earmarked in my cookbooks and to bring a little different flair to our typical menu. I'll keep you posted on how it all goes - more regularly than I've been doing, I promise.

Here's to a great week - Cheers!

Maureen

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year everyone!

I hope you all had a wonderful 2010 and have much to look forward to in 2011. We had a great celebration on New Year's Eve at home, with a bunch of our friends coming over to celebrate. We ate, drank, played Xbox, Kinect, cards and more. It was exactly the kind of low-key, yet so fun, way I wanted to ring in the New Year.

I also am thrilled to start out the New Year with an exciting piece of blog news - I am now an official guest blogger over at foomies.com. Head on over and check out my first piece about our Thanksgiving celebration: www.foomies.com/blog/?p=252

Here's to a happy, healthy and fun 2011.

Cheers!
Maureen