Author: Livia N

I am still working through the two heads of romaine. The lettuce is washed, and cut, and in the salad spinner.

For the salad dressing, I’m thinking lime juice, a little mayonnaise, a little sesame oil, and some yogurt.I sometimes order groceries on delivery. So sometimes you have to expect that you’ll be surprised by a daikon radish that doesn’t even fit in your produce drawer. And here’s a chonky carrot, too!

I sometimes order groceries on delivery. So sometimes you have to expect that you’ll be surprised by a daikon radish that doesn’t even fit in your produce drawer. And here’s a chonky carrot, too!

so while I was cutting up radish for the salad, I also cut it up into a few other configurations for future meals (thin slices like for banh mi, rounds of mostly carrot, and not pictured was the rest on long batons like you get Lebanese turnip pickles with beets – and now I have to harvest the better from the garden before I finish munching on the radish.) But those three containers got some vinegar and went in the fridge, and then what was left on the cutting board went into the salad.

On the far right of this picture you see what looks like a jar of Laoganma. It’s actually a mostly finished jar that I then filled with 2 sliced Persian cucumbers, some peanut butter, some soy sauce, a little bit of hoison sauce, and some black vinegar. That’s been hanging out in my fridge for a couple days and it’s now delicious and also going on the salad.

And then in the foreground of the picture you see me cutting up some king mushrooms into strips to cook until nice and brown and then add to the salad.

Sauteing some strips of beef that were marinated in soy sauce and rice wine. That also goes on the salad! You can see the partially assembled salad in the background next to the dressing.

Look at that beautiful salad! It does have some dressing thoroughly mixed in with the lettuce, but as soon as we’re don’t taking pictures, all the rest of the dressing is getting dumped on top! (not photogenic, but tasty)

This recipe inspiration is from The Delicious Crescent. I don’t follow them, but it seemed like a clever Idea when I tripped over it on the internet.

There’s the rest of the one cauliflower I grew!
And small yellow potatoes from Aldi’s
And all of the ripe Juliet tomatoes left from my garden
And an onion

They get tossed with vegetable oil, grated ginger, grated garlic, powdered coriander, garam masala, chili powder, cumin seeds, turmeric, and some salt

Everything gets tossed on the roasting pan (lined with a silicone sheet to make cleanup easier).

After it had been roasting at 400F for almost an hour (30 minutes and then I stirred everything and tasted. The potatoes were still pretty firm, so I stirred everything and put it back for another 25 minutes), the potatoes were creamy all the way through and the tomatoes had some lovely caramelization.

Then I put the aloo gobi on a plate with saffron rice. And for some reason I felt like it was missing a secondary vegetable dish, so I heated up a microwave packet of Indian tomatoes and eggplant (and after I put like half a cup on the plate, I put the extra in the refrigerator). And then I toasted up a couple parathas cooked from the freezer and put some yogurt in a bowl.

I think I liked the roasted version better than the times I tried to make aloo gobi using the recipes on the DVD extras from Bend it Like Beckham. I will definitely make this again.

These are going in reverse chronological order

First meal I made after my oven died was shakshuka – so I was toasting the bread on a skillet while I was poaching/braising the eggs, but you need toast to dip into the yummy!

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There’s a lot of regional rivals over which local convenience store or gas station has the best food. I don’t think there has to be a best, but if you’re looking for some of the menu standouts at Wawa, I recommend this pierogi quesadilla. It’s mashed potatoes inside a tortilla with two kinds of cheese (I picked cheddar and pepper jack). I like adding pickled jalapeños and getting a side of sour cream.

If I ever end up with leftover mashed potatoes (highly unlikely) I would make this at home.

One of the other things I recommend from Wawa is that they make their hot chocolate by melting mini chocolate chips in steamed milk!

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I am still – as much as possible – eating outside. Partly because of covid, but also because even before that I significantly preferred outdoor service. This is New Deck, an Irish pub that’s loud and crowded inside and probably has sports that everyone is shouting over. But outside I can eat my meal in peace. And there’s even a heater for their outdoor tables!

(By the time I left, there were two other tables of people eating outside as well)

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This was an exceptionally mild and tasty grapefruit! I got a bag of five of them from Weee!

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Okay, I ate indoors for this one. But Amma’s is so good and it was very late at night with no one sitting near me. It was my treat for getting the laundry to the laundromat before they closed.

I ordered the prix fix South Indian dinner (with meat) and got this stunning thali.

I don’t actually know what’s in the pretty little dishes surrounding the bowl with rice, but it’s two soups, 3 veg dishes, 2 meat, 1 biryani, a pickle, raita, and dessert.

Just as much work as a fully cooked meal.

First I washed and spun the lettuce and pulled some ingredients together

The salad dressing was about a Tablespoon of mayonnaise, half a cup of plain yogurt, and then I went in with the salsa but it wasn’t giving me either the texture or intensity of flavor that I wanted – so I switched to three packets of Taco Bell’s fire sauce. I don’t often eat from Taco Bell, but I have to every now and then because I haven’t found a better set of for sauces than their sauce packets for giving my lunches a variety of easy flavor boats that are each a bit different. Anyway – I also added some Penzey’s southwest seasoning, and that was it.

Also in the picture you can see that I’ve got some (1/4 lb) ground beef going in a skillet with sliced onions and orange bell pepper. The ground beef was marinated in Southwest seasoning, corn starch, a little baking soda, soy sauce, shaoxing wine, and some water.

I added some dressing to the lettuce and then added a sliced jalapeño and two sliced tomatoes #frommygarden . Also some sliced cucumber and cheddar cheese. Then I added most of the rest of the dressing and stirred everything together.

When I added the hot toppings (beef, onions, and peppers), the cheese got a little soft and the flavors came together. A drizzle more of the dressing, and it’s time to eat.

My mother had a dish she would make when we were very hungry and very low on energy or interest in cooking – it was like a casserole you make in the microwave

Take 1 can of condensed cream of chicken soup, 1 drained can of tuna, and a random amount of leftover rice. Mix them together, microwave for 2 minutes, mix again, microwave for two minutes again, mix again, and then top with sliced american cheese and dust with paprika (cause that makes it fancy!), and then finish with another 2 minutes in the microwave.

Well, I didn’t make that tonight because at the moment I don’t have soup in my pantry or canned tuna, but I do have a pint of cooked rice, half a jar of leftover alfredo sauce, and canned sardines!

So I started off with a random bit of onion on my fridge waiting for a purpose, and I diced and sauteed that until soft (mostly just to give myself something to do so I would Wait until the pan was properly hot before adding the rice). Then I added the rice!  I cooked the rice until it was properly hot, but I wasn’t patient enough to wait for toasty bits.

I added some minced garlic and then all the alfredo sauce I had. Drained and added the sardines, mixing them to get them broken up and evenly distributed. I added half a teaspoon of ground chilies for fun.

Then when everything was ready, I put it on a plate, topped it with a slice of american cheese, dusted with paprika, and put it in the microwave for 40 seconds so that I could preserve the traditional presentation!