Roasted cream of mushroom soup

Mushrooms are some of my favorite things in the world and I love soup in general.  I had a hankering for cream of mushroom soup.  I don't care if the temperature outside is hot, I'll still drink hot coffee and tea and eat hot soup.  Using my Bruce Lee approach in picking out the best features of the good looking recipes, I saw leeks and shiitake mushrooms as pretty interesting additions to the base of the soup.  Trader Joe's has frozen leeks which is great to use in a pinch.  I chopped up my mushrooms into larger chunks than usual I think, I think thinner slices might or a small dice might actually be better for the soup.  Overall it was good, thought I thought the shiitakes were pretty overwhelming- they just have a such a strong taste compared to other mushrooms that it was all I tasted and the chewy texture takes away from the creaminess of the soup I think.  I'll have to make a mushroom stock next time since it seems I can't just put cooked criminis and button mushrooms in water and make soup because the flavor is really weak. Next time.

For some reason I can't upload modified pics, it only uploads them what they originally looked like.  Oh well. 

Girls who can tenderize my meat: Nadia Giosia

The Cooking Channel is the channel that Food Network was back in the day: more shows about cooking and the world of food rather than food entertainment or whatever they're showing.  One of the things about watching a new channel is that there are new televisions chefs to get acquainted with.  On the Food Network rotating cast of characters revolved around Emeril, Bobby Flay, Giada, Rachel Ray, etc.  Which is nice and comfortable but sometimes you need to get exposed to different chefs, new personalities, and different interpretations of food. 
The Cooking Channel has a show called "Bitchin Kitchen" with this sort of punk rock girl in a cocktail dress cooking food and with this Rock n Roll/Punk Jersey Shore Italian act going.  The cooking is good and the show seems to have a Good Eats entertainment vibe in that there are little skits and characters and a theme to each episode.  I haven't figured out Cooking Channel's tv schedule, and since it's not like the Food Network in that they don't replay the same shows over and over I haven't really watched her show enough but it's actually kinda cool. 
Anyway, I think she's kinda cute some times too and she wears high heels and a dress in the kitchen usually, which is interesting but I don't hate it.

Lightened up wrap (?)

Had a hankering for pastrami so looked on the intertubes for suggestions and ran across a pastrami bacon wrap that was 'lightened up a bit from it's originial version at a deli shop.  It basically consists of pastrami, bacon, swiss, and sriracha.  Sriracha has a little bit of sugar so, as strange as it may sound, I mixed that with a little bit of mayonaisse to lighten it up carb wise.  Otherwise I basically kept the recipe the same.  I think the sriracha is a nice sweet touch to offset some of the smokiness of the meats in the wrap. 
Oh and I looked at the carb content of the lavash wraps a little closer and saw that it was 5 carbs per serving.  I have no idea how you figure out how many servings are in a single large of lavash is using mathemagics I figured it was about 20 grams of carbs per wrap.  Not bad as half a wrap is all that's needed for anything really but sort of disappointing.

Lavash Pizza

So one of the things I do now while trying to cut down carbs is looking at the nutritional facts more and more.  I've read somewhere that around 50 carbs a day is a pretty good goal to in that low carb fat burning mode.  To put that into a little perspective- a can of Coca-Cola has about 40 grams of carbs, and a piece of Wonderbread has 15 grams of carbs.  I ran across some flax seed lavash, a very flat middle eastern flat bread.  It's almost thinner and a lot more fragile than tortillas; it's breaking apart as you pull it from the bag.  But it's only 5 grams per piece which is pretty amazing.  One piece is probably a couple feet long too.  I've tried using it create a burrito but it falls apart way too easily.
I had a hankering for pizza so I did a grilled pizza with it.  Just brushed it it a little quickly made herb garlic oil  (I may need to use more next time to keep the bread from getting too crisp.) tossed it on the grill for a minute or two, took it out and topped it, put it back on the grill (turned off) with the cover on for like 45 seconds.  It was pretty good, basically has all the flavors of a pizza,  and a nice way to help with any cravings. 

Slice n' dice

Since I've been going grocery shopping basically everday one of my favorite spots is Pacific Ranch Market in my hometown of Orange, CA. It has a lot of specialty items and there's a great butcher and deli section. Like I'll go there if I'm looking for a goose or something. The prices are way too high in general so everday stuff I'd go somewhere else. Anyway, while shopping there during the week I saw a sign advertising knife sharpening. The next day I went to get a couple knives sharpened and it's totally amazing on how much of a difference it makes.
A few years ago browsing food related web sites and forums was a huge part of my everday routine. One of the topics that a ran across was kitchen knives. There seems to be a little subsection of people who are really into their knives, how to sharpen them, collecting, etc. I guess Japanese kitchen knives are really specialized- one for vegetables, one for blow fish, sashimi. They're really cool, they almost look like mini samurai swords. I finally decided to buy one after thinking of getting one for a couple years. The cheapest Japanese chef's knife may be over 100 bucks so it's a major purchase by my small standards. I've seen some knives that go for thousands of dollars, it gets pretty crazy. I just bought one on the cheaper side but it seems to be highly regarded by the internet Japanese kitchen knife crowd. I'm pretty excited.

Back in action

It's been a long time world. I'm sure there's no one here but well,that's ok. I'm just leaving a little mark on the world, like that lone cave man who painted pictures on the wall. Anyway at least I've been cooking a bit more. Things have changed in my life so I have a bit more time dedicated to myself I guess you can say. I've been trying to go a bit more low carb or cut out as many carbs out as possible so that usually means more grocery shopping for meats and veggies and more cooking. I'm not totally strict or too crazy about counting carbs or anything. For example, I think a burger and fries is probably one of greatest things ever, so I'll leave room for a great one every once in a while than lousy ones every couple days or something. Anyway, just a small update, I hope I can keep this up a bit more.

Five Guys Burgers and Fries Review

First post in a while but I haven't totally forgotten about you!  I consider myself a hamburger connoisseur - I think a good hamburger is a thing of beauty.  So simple, yet so much potential for soul satisfying goodness.  The first time I heard about Five Guys is when Obama stopped by one on his campaign for presidency.  And this was when his coolness and buzz rating was off the charts, so hey, Five Guys must be awesome if the future president (you all knew he was going to be the president) is getting his munchies there.  Too bad it was a predominantly East coast chain.  But fancy burgers have been a little trend lately.  For example, Denny's introduced a more gourmet burger with 'hand-made' patties just about a year ago.  Actually an improvement I say.  So it was only a matter of time before Five Guys made it over on the West side I guess. 

I walk in, there's a load of signs plasted along the windows facing the street with quotes from various media sources about how great the burgers are.  'Zagat rated'  'Best $5 burger'  Yadda yadda.  And there's a bunch of newspaper and magazine clippings posted everywhere.  Yes, I get it, there's a lot of hype about this place.  The menu is simple enough though you do have to choose your own toppings.  The lady at the register was helpful enough.  I basically chose the 'Everything' burger which I figured was the standard.  It doesn't actually include every topping under the sun despite the name- I think it was: mayo, lettuce, pickles, tomatoes, ketchup, mustard, grilled mushrooms, and grilled onions.  I was asking about the cajun fries but the cashier lady let me have the regular fries with the cajun seasoning on the side since I was a newbie.  Thanks lady. 

I didn't bring my camera and I'm not quite sure how to get pictures off my new crappy cell phone so no pictures, but next time.  I hate to pass judgement on just one tasting anyway.  But here's my first experience. 

A burger from Five Guys is pretty awful.

It's an impressive looking burger.  A couple of thick beef patties (1/3 pound each?), a load of toppings.  Taste wise it's the flavor is not there, it's totally underwhelming.  I tried a couple more bites, still the same result.  I tried a few lonely grilled mushroom that fell out while taking the first bite and that thing was rubbery and tasteless.  I'm a freak for mushrooms, it's one of my favorite things in the world.  So much umami fun-ness in those suckers but these sad things were just filler.   I start to pick apart the burger to see what did have flavor.  The meat patty by itself pretty bleh.  I think they use lean meat because it wasn't juicy at all and they cook their meat well done (according to the menu or something I read).  At least the tomatoes and pickles were good. I actually did see one lady sitting next to me shaking a packet of salt straight onto her burger.  It's not a good sign when people have to season their own food to taste it.

The fries are great though, they're those boardwalk type fries that are nice a thick yet crunchy.  The cajun seasoning is fine, it's like Red Robin's seasoning salt or whatever, it's definitely good to get on the side.  

The 500 dollar blender on my wishlist

All I have in my apartment is an immersion stick blender, which is useful and a good multitasker and compact enough for a lot of easy blending jobs, especially soups or sauces.  Lately I've been finding it lacking in the smoothie and drink making department, but I've finally experienced the straw that broke the camel's back. 

So I'm been digging these expensive chocolate soymilk protein drinks like from Odwalla or something, but it's basically soymilk, sugar (or cane juice or whatever they call it), chocolate, and banana (mostly for texture I think or else the drink would be too thin and watery).  Supposedly chocolate milk is good for you some how, like a great post work out drink.  Anyway, I get an idea for just a Mexican chocolate milk, just blend up milk, cocoa powder with some chipotle and arbol powder, and cinnamon.  Now, if you've ever blown bubbles into your milk when you were a kid, you would know that the milk can create a large mass of foam.  Well, that's what happened, milk spilled over the cup after 2-3 seconds of blending with my stick blender(even though I only poured enough milk to fill the cup half way).  I poured some of the milk out and some how lost a huge load of cocoa powder into the sink too because it didn't even get integrated into the milk.  I tried whisking the mix a little bit more hoping to recover something for the ordeal but it was no use as the drink was a gritty mess. 

I've been wanting to drink more smoothies lately since they're easy, tasty, and pretty nutritious.  And way too expensive when buying it outside at juice places or buying bottles of it.  Using my stick blender has been a hassle since it has trouble pulverizing frozen fruit.  After doing a little research on blenders and watching Alton use it, I came across the Vita-Mix.  Supposedly comparing regular blenders to a Vitamix is like comparing a shovel to a bulldozer.  This is basically food service grade stuff.  It apparently canpulverize the raspberry seeds in your smoothies and can make soup with the heat of its motor if what the people on the forum are saying is true.  The model I'm looking at is like $450.00 though.  Bleh.  I'll probably get one eventually, I'm totally loving what I'm hearing about this thing. 

A sandwich 5 years in the making

One of my favorite shows on Food Network is "Best Thing I Ever Ate."  Each week has a theme and it just has a bunch of talking head interviews with celebrity chefs or food personalities who wax poetic (is that how I use that term?) about their favorite dish spliced with footage of the dish/restaurant/whatever.  I dig how everyone is just so passionate about what they'r eating. Cat Cora mentioned this sandwich here at about the 3 minute mark at a place in Santa Maria that looked really good.  I always wanted to go to Santa Maria to try their barbeque back when I lived in Santa Barbara 5 years ago, which is just about 1 1/2 hours south of there.  Supposedly it's one of these great traditional barbeque enclaves like Kansas City or Memphis with their own unique culinary specialties you can't find done well anywhere else.  I never made the trip there but maybe one of these days when I'm traveling up and down California.  Anyway, the traditional cut of meat of Santa Maria is tri-tip, and I saw a smaller 2 1/2 pound roast for sale wandering the meat aisle at S-Mart after checking out the discount produce.  I figured I'd finally try making it myself during the long Easter break.  I probably spent like 4 hours going to 3-4 stores collecting the right things, like going to OSH to get wood for smoking, Safeway to get bread, another grocery store which I knew had a wider variety of barbeque sauces, balsamic vinegar, etc.

Preparing the Santa Maria style salsa and tri tip was pretty simple.  I followed most of this recipe for the salsa.  Most of the traditional recipes for Santa Maria tri tip uses like a dry rub consisting of garlic powder, garlic salt, pepper, and dried parsley.  I don't have garlic salt and just used garlic powder and salt and  added in fresh garlic and parsley for more flavor (I apparently forgot at the time that fresh garlic and herbs burn on the grill).  I used some hickory chips for smoking and cooked it on a gas grill over high heat for a few minutes and then over indirect heat until a digital thermometer read around 132 ish.  Not sure if anyone knows what a digital thermometer is but you leave a metal probe inside the meat and a coated wire comes out from it, and I ended up burning my finger trying to take the probe out after cooking.  Sort of sucked. 

The sandwich was really good overall, probably one of my better dishes I've cooked in a while.   

Salmon burgers

Here's a random concoction I made up, trying to make something interesting out of fish like tacos or something that isn't just a piece of fish on a plate.  I keep some frozen salmon and mahi mahi around in case I think of something to make, and I forced myself to take a piece out of the freezer and thaw out in my fridge and use it.  At first I was just going to cook it and eat it plain with some vegetables on the side but never got around to cooking it.  After a few days and some panic over whether it was going to spoil soon I thought I should make a burger out of it.  I think most of the recipes for salmon burgers were like recipes for tuna salad: some herbs, some pickles like capers or cornichons, and mayonnaise.  I put a little chili sauce and a bit more yogurt than mayonnaise.

For some reason I thought the mayonnaise and yogurt would basically make the salmon patty un-overcookable but I was wrong. The patty was leaking a bunch of water as I let it set up in the fridge and it was this super wet unmanagable mixture.  The thing was falling apart in the pan too, so I figured it would take a while before getting overcooked.  If you ever had overcooked fish, or any overcooked piece of meat really, it's basically inedible.  It's like eating cotton balls, the food like sucks all the saliva out of your mouth and it's tasteless.  I chose an awful bun to eat it on too.  I got a dutch crunch roll from WinCo but it was terribly dense.  It was disappointing because I was looking forwards to eating it but I could barely take a couple bites out of it.  Ah well.

Alton Brown Approved: Sardines on toast

I was watching Good Eats a few months ago and Alton did an episode about dieting.  I didn't catch the whole episode but it did make me notice that Alton has been looking mighty skinny on those Welch's commercials.  I haven't watched the last few seasons of Good Eats as regularly as I'd like, mostly because a lot of his show topics are hit or miss, but apparently he was a huge balloon last season.  He says he lost 50 pounds in 9 months so kudos to him.  This dieting episode wasn't all that great, like he showed how to make a smoothie, making it way more complicated than it has to be.  He did talk passionately about sardines which made me get some.  I'm not stranger to sardines though, I used to have rolls of bread filled with sardines packed in tomato sauce in elementary school. Maybe it's an Asian thing.  I went to the Food4Less around here and wandered down the Asian section and they had cans of sardines packed in tomato sauce stored there right next to the oyster sauce and whatever.

Alton made some sardines on toast, with a shmear of avocado to offset the fishiness.  Avocados are expensive as hell too and mixing it with fish seems weird, so I vetoed that idea.  I don't know if the stronger fishy flavor of these fish bothers people, it's not like it's a bad sign like a fishy smelling hooker is.  It's just a different taste.  Anyway, get some sardines packed in oil, brush the bread with that canning oil.  I thought that was the coolest step Alton did.  The sardines themselves you can just smoosh on some sourdough bread.  I put some herbs, roasted tomatoes, and some lemon in the mix too.  It's a pretty good late night snack or quick meal. 

Pan evolution

Having good equipment in the kitchen is essential to making good food, and since I'm a guy getting a bunch of random gadgets is always fun.  I read a good post on the internets about steel pans detailing their pros and I read they were basically the same type of pans that are used in restaurants.  I always figured, if its good enough in the industry it's probably really good for me.  I thought I had to go to a restaurant supply store to get them but never got to go to one.  I did try going to the closest restaurant supply store near me once but it was closed down.   But then I saw that Sur la Table was carrying the pan I wanted so I eventually picked up a couple.  Steel pans need to be seasoned and cured like cast iron pans.  I don't understand the entire process, but it's something about attaching carbon to the metal toa nonstick surface.  Supposedly it's nicer than teflon pans and the like since there aren't chemicals to create the nonstick surface, so that's an added bonus. 

I bought one pan a week ago from Sur la Table and been seasoning it for fun for the past week.  It takes years to create an awesome surface from regular normal cooking but I've just been seasoning my pans for fun.  I just stick all of my cast iron and steel pans into an oven with a little oil inside and just bake them for a while at various temperatures.  Sort of sad what I do for fun, but it's kind of fun to look at how it changes. It's like those fashion people who like those distinctive wrinkles in their jeans after wearing them for a long time.

Meatballs and garlic bread

Meh, here's another thing that I was too lazy to post up.  Here's another dinner idea I stole from Everyday Food, meatballs with a some garlic bread on the side.  I always liked meatballs as a kid, which are basically the only good part of spaghetti and meatballs.  Whenever I got to an Italian restaurant I'm always tempted by the spaghetti and meatballs, but I really don't want the spaghetti.  Whenever I buy TV dinners spaghetti and meatballs or swedish meatballs are some of my favorite entrees to buy.  But then I feel like I have to eat the pasta or else I'm wasting a lot of food.  Maybe if the pasta were acting more as a side dish than a cohort or main part in the dish.  Ah well.

Meatballs make semi-good leftovers too since they can turn into sandwiches. 

Red Lobster Redux

I didn't eat anything all day and I was starving by the time I got out of class at 4:30, so I went out to eat.  I decided to go to Red Lobster for the first time without having the all you can eat shrimp.  I was thinking of getting just something small, I was hoping they had some kind of soup and sandwich deal because I was curious about their clam chowder.  I don't think I've had it there and I consider mysellf a connoisseur of them.  The menu at Red Lobster is pretty limited.  I guess I could've ordered an appetizer.  It looked like they started selling their lobster nachos again.  There's a little symbol that says "New" above it about I think they just brought it out of retirement.  I would've gotten but I didn't want to fill up my bad food quota so early in the week. 
Anyway, I just ordered off their daily fresh fish menu.  I think Anthony Bourdain said to not eat fish on Monday because restaurants get their fish on Thursdays for the weekend so the restaurant is basically trying to get rid of it on Monday.  Not sure if that counts for a place like Red Lobster where who knows where they get their fish but whatever.  Man, eating fish is an expensive proposition.  I always though Red Lobster was like the Sizzler or Olive Garden of seafood, like it was a running joke that the food was mass produced and thus cheap.  But it's about 15 bucks for a half portion of red snapper.  Yeah a half portion is what a normal sized portion should be, the size of a deck of cards, but still disappointing for some reason.  I guess I'm too used to eating all you can eat shrimp there for about the same price.  The fish was decent enough.  I got it grilled but it might be better broiled because it was a little dry.

Potato tacos

Here's another thing I made a while ago that I was too lazy to post on.  So I had a hankering for potato tacos one day.  I first had potato tacos while in a Spanish class with good ol' Ms. Fajardo at Santiago Canyon College during the Summer.  Everyone had to do a presentation in Spanish about how to cook something. "Cut the onions"  "Mix together" etc., relatively simple stuff.  Ms. Fajardo brought in potato tacos for everyone and did a little presentation on how to make them.  Even cold they were pretty great.  I tried making them at home but I suck at frying.  I don't have anything the technique or why it's not bad (thanks Alton Brown).  I just feel weird about using up so much oil to make one dish.  I know professional fryers say that the flavor of fried food is better from used oil and actually put used oil in new batches of oil, so yeah I know you can reuse oil but it's just awkward to me. 

Anyway, I just tried shallow frying these tacos, where basically the oil only goes up about half way up your food instead of completely covering it in deep frying.  I ended up burning most of my first batch but a few tacos made it out unscathed.  I didn't remember if flour or corn tortilla were more traditional, but I used flour because I figured that texture might be crispier but I don't think the flavor was there.  The potato filling was bland too, not sure if I needed to salt it more or what.  For something so simple it sure is a pain the the ass to make. 

Girls who can tenderize my meat: Camille Becerra

Here's a chef that I was in love with that was on Top Chef season 3 for a few episodes.  I thought she was absolutely cute but the sad thing was that she barely had any talking head interviews or even have her dishes show up in the competition.  She wasn't the token eye candy on the show (I believe that role was taken up by Casey Thompson that season), the token villain/pain the ass person, or token punk rocker so I guess Bravo didn't have a reason to show her.  And believe me, I went through and rewatched each of the 4 episodes that she was in before she got eliminated plenty of times.  But at least she's cute enough to show up in random modeling pictures with her doing random stuff with food, yaaah!  I remember there's a great picture of her chopping up some beef sort of sexily, which gives a guy foodie like me a hard on, but I can't remember where I saved it.  Oh well. 

Eggplant dip

Here's the first thing I've actually cooked in quite a while.  There's a supermarket chain called S-mart, which has pretty lousy prices and there isn't a great deli, bakery, meat department, or anything inside so I don't go there too often.  Sometimes I go in if I don't feel like battling the crowds at WinCo for one item or to use the BofA atm inside.  The one great thing about S-mart though is that they have a little cart full of discounted veggies and fruits that are somewhat beyond ripe.  I bought 4 avocados once for 69 cents, it was the greatest thing ever.  Yeah they were a little brown on the inside but it was still tasty.
Anyway, I saw some eggplant going for sale, but I don't cook with it very often and don't run across it at restaurants too often.  The only idea that I could think of was making baba ganoush, so I grabbed one, roasted it with some garlic and blended with some tahini I bought a few days later (8 bucks a bottle!), lemon, and parsley.  Toasted up some whole wheat pita chips and everything good to go.

Breakfast Ultra Combo

Here's an oldie that I made a while ago.  I always skip breakfast because I'd rather have those last precious minutes of sleep before I absolutely have to leave for class than eat.   So I had the idea of stocking my fridge with items in order to whip up a quick breakfast sandwich in the morning.  I cooked up a bunch of fresh breakfast sausage and froze them, froze some bacon, and froze a box of english muffins.  Eggs only take a few minutes to scramble up and I always have cheese in the refridgerator.  With all this stuff I was hoping to be cooking and done in about 15-20 minutes: stick bacon in toaster oven, english muffin in toaster, eggs in pan, microwave sausage, assemble and top with cheese.  At least that's what the vision I had in my head was, I never actually attempted making it it in the middle of the week.  Here's one sandwich I made during one weekend.  Unwieldy but still good. 

Food, food, everywhere, nor any morsel to eat

Yeah, no cooking really still.  I did spend like $40 bucks on bunch of vegetables to make myself one my mounds of salads but haven't gotten to prepping the veggies and stuff.  I went out to get some fish or seafood but I have no idea where to get that at like 8:30 at night.  There's plenty of fast food joints and Mexican places around here but I think the only place I know of on the top of my head around here is Red Lobster.  I might have to check that place out again and see what kind of healthy stuff they have because I associate that place with fried shrimp, shrimp scampi, and cheese biscuits. 

I drove around Stockton looking for a healthy place to eat at and got to see some of the seemingly scarier parts.  Like I've never seen a lot of these stores (like Rite Aid) with iron bars and gates in front before.  I ended up going to Burger King hoping they'd have entree salad but I didn't see it.  I think Burger King probably has the most convoluted menu out of all the fast food joints.  Anyway, I got the side salad which was probably the most depressing salad I have ever seen.  Just iceburg lettuce, a few slices of tomato, and some cheese.  Carrots are usually standard on these types of things but that's a bit too fancy for the King.  I also got a Whopper Jr. when I really shouldn't have.  I have no willpower.  BK has a veggie burger, which was news to me.  I've had a veggie burger before but didn't pay much attention to it, so I'll have to try it again. 

Eating/cooking sabbatical

Not to worry, I do have the blog in the back corner of my mind.  I stopped cooking a few weeks ago because it was the week before Spring break and I didn't want to have a bunch of food rotting away in my fridge for a week.  Not that I cleaned out my fridge or cleaned out the trash before I left for home, which would have been nice.  Coming home to moldy dishes in the sink and stinky raw chicken in the trash isn't fun.  But at least I didn't have any extra food lying around in the fridge.  During Spring break I just went out to all the restaurants and fast food places that I don't have easy access to while up at school.

I haven't been eating lately due to some personal and health issues. I want to shift my diet towards more veggies and fruit for my own sake but I'm still a bit lost.  I do want to take up cooking soon again because eating a lot bananas, nuts, and chips and salsa isn't exciting. Unhealthy but awesomely tasty cooking is pretty intuitive, but I'm lost for inspiration on how to make healthy stuff.  I'll figure it out soon enough.  I do have some leftover pictures to blog about I suppose.