Foodie Adventures

I do love making sauces from scratch! In this case, I had a request from a good friend, so I modified my "across the board" asian sauce to include the orange flavor.

Asian Sauce (good for all asian dishes, especially tuna and cucumbers over rice)

1 part soy sauce
1 part seasoned rice vinegar
1 part water
Healthy squeeze of honey
a splash of seasame oil
some red pepper flakes
some ground ginger
sprinkle of seasame seeds

Tonights modifications

some corn starch to thicken it up some
added a touch of sriracha hot sauce
fresh squeezed orange
a spoon of brown sugar

Simmer these ingredients until cornstarch is fully dissolved and mixture thickens some, and keep the orange peel in the pot, but remove when its done.

In this case I feel like I am still missing a little something. Dont get me wrong, its still great on some beef and broccoli and lo mein stir fry. But, it doesnt have quite the punch I was expecting.

Tonight we were entertaining some guests, and I had been dabbling in some fried foods lately. They had requested fried chicken before hand, so I got excited and accepted the challenge.


Batter:
2 parts flour
1 part corn meal
a generous sprinkle of garlic salt
a healthy dash of spicy paprika
12oz beer (honey lager would be good)
1/4 cup honey
add water until you get that good batter consistency

I took 3 good size chicken breasts, cut them in half and hammered them out flat with a meat mallet. Heated up peanut oil at level 7 on my stove top, battered the chicken and chucked it in the oil. When it got golden on one side I flipped it and waited for it to get golden on the flip side and they were done! GREAT SUCCESS!

Leftovers, I chopped up, breading and all, and tossed with some honey BBQ sauce for a "supa" chicken BBQ sandwhich!

My wife and I have been foodies for some time. Both of us rather enjoy trying new things and experimenting in the kitchen. This weekend was significant enough, that I felt inspired to start a food blog.


Saturday Breakfast:
My wife decided it was time to make bagels from scratch. Neither of us had ever done it, so she did a little research and took the plunge. Not only was it a successful adventure, but the results were fantastic. She made Asiago cheese bagels from start to finish, VERY NICE!


Saturday afternoon:
My wife consistently complains that chocolate cake we get in restaurants is not dense and rich enough. I had a cake idea that had been brewing in my mind long before that, and since her birthday is coming up, I told her that I would make her birthday cake. In typical “me” fashion, I took things to a certain extreme. I bought two boxes of the fudgiest brownies I could find and made three pans of brownies. I added almond extract to the brownie batter for some depth of flavor. Then I stacked the brownies on top of each other in typical layer cake fashion. The frosting I used was store bought chocolate fudge frosting, but I mixed, into the icing, Kahlua Liquor, Amaretto Liquor, and cinnamon. Once the cake was properly iced, I drizzled caramel ribbons on top, then finely chopped pecans, and then dusted the whole top with a cinnamon sugar mixture. YUM! It was also a success, but we had to eat small slices.

Fudge Cake

We went to Osaka for dinner (AMAZING) I ordered everything and ate my weight in Japanese food. I started off with the edamame, then got the octopus salad, then she got dragon roll sushi (that I tasted) that was amazing. (Broiled eel with the sweet brown sauce rolled with Scallions and cucumbers, but the they had sliced avocado paper thin and wrapped the outside of the sushi roll in layers that looks like dragon scales. The avocado was perfectly ripe and added a sweet nutty flavor to the sushi…super good!) She also got the sweet potato sushi roll. (Mashed sweet potatoes, flattened and tempura fried and rolled in nori and rice. Then the main course was Kung Pao Alligator. (Wild caught Floridian Alligator cooked Kung Pao style with a spicy red sauce and peanuts. The meal came with some Miso Soup that was the best I had ever had.

Dragon Roll

More to come as meals roll out!