Tofu Pad Thai

Paul and I have been talking about making pad thai forever. We decided to just bite the bullet, and give it a whirl. We even upped the ante (during an eventful Saturday night out) by inviting two friends over to partake with us. I usually make it my rule not to invite people when we are trying something that is really new or challenging for us, just in case things go wrong. Apparently, a couple beers made us forget this informal rule.

Deep breath. You can do this. 

After reading about 900 pad thai recipes online, I finally selected one from my boy, Mark Bittman. I had picked up the rice noodles, but could not find some of the ingredients I kept seeing in all the recipes -- tamarind paste in particular, and also bean sprouts. I did see some recipes without the tamarind paste, so I figured it would be okay. 


The rice noodles are cooked differently than pasta noodles. Instead of boiling water, and cooking the pasta in the boiling water, you boil water and then pour it over the rice noodles (i.e. it does not need to be continuously boiling/cooking). The noodles soak until they are tender enough to eat, but not mushy. I think ours sat for about 15 minutes or so? I just kept tasting them until they were softened through. We then drained the noodles, and stirred in a bit on peanut oil to keep them from sticking to one another. 

Easy enough.

In a small saucepan, combine the fish sauce, (tamarind paste if you were able to find it) honey and rice vinegar. Heat over medium-low heat until it simmers. Add red pepper flakes, and set aside. 

Have we talked about how bad fish sauce smells? Yerg. I tried to reassure our guests that it would be okay (I hoped I wasn't lying). 

Since we weren't sure how the pad thai was going to turn out, I had a backup plan. Frozen P.F. Chang's Beef and Broccoli. I wasn't going to take the chance that we'd have nothing to eat at all, or that we'd run out of food. 

Plan B.

We went the matchstick route for the tofu. Looking back, I probably would have cubed it for this recipe. 

The tofu continued to dry out on the cutting board. Wet tofu does not make for easy stir-frying.

Put the remaining oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. When the oil shimmers, add the scallions and garlic, and cook for a minute. Then add the eggs to the pan.

Once the eggs start to set, scramble them until they are just done. 

Add the cabbage (and bean sprouts, if you can find them) and continue to cook until the cabbage begins to wilt. Then add in the tofu. 


Here's where it started to get dicey. I had a hard time keeping the tofu from becoming a giant crumbly pile as I mixed everything together. You are to cook the tofu until it begins to brown, but I had a hard time doing that. It was mixed in with the egg mixture and didn't appear to be changing color as it cooked. 


Once it is browned, you add the drained noodles and the cooked sauce. For us (with our non-browning tofu) I chose to mix everything once I realized our friends had already had a bottle of wine, and it was getting late. 

Maybe they have had enough wine that they'll like this, even if it is missing tamarind paste. 

I tasted it here, and thought it was bland. Then I realized, I had cooked the entire package of rice noodles, and not the 4 oz suggested in the recipe (essentially double the noodles with only one batch of sauce). Oops. We opened up another bottle of wine and quickly made another batch of the sauce. That helped a LOT. I am not always so good with the ratios...or the reading of the recipes. 


Serve the pad thai with lime wedges, chopped peanuts and cilantro. 

Plans A AND B. They both made it on the plate. Woohoo!

The pad thai actually turned out pretty good. The flavors were pretty close to the pad thai you'd get at a restaurant. You got both sweet and sour flavors, and the cilantro, peanuts and lime really added a nice touch to it. I think having the correct noodles helped as well, vs. substituting some sort of pasta in place of the rice noodles. You could tell a little something was missing -- and I'm guessing it was that tamarind paste. I'll have to do a better job of hunting it down at the store, and we'll try it again!  

Thai Beef with Chiles and Basil Over Coconut Rice

I found this recipe online -- and after seeing "coconut rice," immediately added the ingredients to the grocery list. It looked easy enough to make, and we usually have items like soy sauce, coconut milk and basil in the house. To make the coconut rice, combine the jasmine rice, coconut milk and water in a saucepan. Cook like you would regular rice (bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer and leave, covered for about 25 minutes).

Getting ready...

While the rice is cooking, we prepped the other ingredients. We purchased long, banana peppers instead of jalepenos, and clipped some basil from our plant.

The banana peppers aren't hot like jalepenos. 

We seeded and sliced the peppers into matchsticks. Heat up the wok/skillet to a high heat, adding the oil. Once the oil is warmed, add the garlic  (we used minced instead of chopping fresh garlic) and half the sliced peppers.


Cook, stirring constantly for about 15 seconds. Add the beef, and cook until browned (about 4 minutes). Make sure the meat is broken up so it can cook evenly.

Mmmm...e coli. Just kidding. 

Prep the sauce by mixing the fish sauce, soy sauce and sugar. 

FYI, if you haven't cooked with fish sauce before -- it smells bad. But it's a necessary ingredient in a lot of Asian dishes, so just try not to sniff it directly. 

Add the soy mixture to the beef, and cook for about 30 seconds. Add in the remaining peppers and the basil leaves.

I like cooking some of the peppers at the beginning and then adding in the others at the end, so there is a mixture of soft and crunchy. 

Serve the Thai beef over the coconut rice, and with lime slices on the side.

Ding! Dinner. 

The dinner was easy to make, and quick to cook (another advantage of stir-frying). It was tasty, but using the banana peppers definitely made it more mild that (I think) the recipe suggested. Paul and I added a little Sriracha just to perk it up a bit. Now the coconut rice, on the other hand, needs nothing. It is awesome. I pretty much have decided that I'm going to make coconut rice with our Asian dishes from now on. It's seriously delicious, and it's easy to kick up white rice a notch. Enjoy!

June 25 (and about 10 times since then, so it's sort of current): Homemade Pizza

We love pizza. It's true. I think Paul and I could eat a different type of pizza every night of the week. We started making our own at home a while back, using pre-made pizza bread from the grocery store. After delving into our fave cookbook, How to Cook Everything Vegetarian, we started making our own dough. It is SUPER easy to make, as long as you have instant yeast lying around (which we now do all the time for this purpose).

We make the dough in the food processor, but you can also make it by hand or in your stand mixer. Combine 3 cups of flour, the yeast (I use the whole package of instant yeast -- it's a little more than 2 teaspoons, but whatever) and salt (I use about a teaspoon -- half of what Bittman suggests) in the food processor.

Adding the water. Action shot!

Turn on the machine, and add in 1 cup of water and 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Process for about 30 more seconds, adding additional water 1 tablespoon at a time until the dough becomes a sticky ball. You'll know it's ready because it starts lurching around your food processor. 

Take the dough out of the food processor, and knead it just a few times on a floured surface. Put the dough in a bowl, adding the last tablespoon of olive oil to coat the dough. 

Resting comfortably, waiting for it's moment in the spotlight.

Cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and let it rise for 1 - 2 hours. (Note: You definitely don't have to wait that long -- our hunger has gotten the best of us, and we've let it rise for only 30 minutes and it's been fine.)


After the dough has rested, separate it into two balls of dough. Sprinkle with a little flour, and cover with a towel or plastic wrap. Let those rest for about 20 minutes.


We preheated the oven at this point -- they suggest 500 degrees or higher. We found that 500 degrees was best, especially when you have sensitive smoke detectors to contend with. After frantic running around (a necessary step for solving any loud, beeping problem), this issue is solved by either opening a window when it's cool out, or turning on the overhead fan on the stove ahead of time. Fair warning, people.

While the dough was doing it's thang -- we started prepping the other ingredients. We decided to do a simple margherita pizza, with fresh tomatoes, basil and mozzarella di bufala.

I thought about the mandoline slicer for this, but thought the tomatoes and cheese would get smushed.

We use a baking sheet to cook the pizza dough, so they suggest oiling the sheet (we used a little more olive oil) and actually spreading out the dough on the sheet rather than rolling it out on a floured surface and trying to transfer it. 

Sprinkle the dough with a little more salt and olive oil and start adding your toppings. We started with some store bought pizza sauce, but you could certainly use your own (or do our other fave - a white pizza! See the bottom of the page for that).

Paul hard at work.

Here is the pizza, topped with sliced tomatoes, fresh basil, some grated mozzarella cheese underneath and larger pieces of mozzarella di bufala on top. 
 

Slightly misshapen, but still looking good!

Into the oven she goes, cooking for about 10 minutes. I started checking it around 8 minutes just to be sure we weren't burning the crust. 

To confirm that it was done, we checked underneath to be sure it is nice and browned. Dunzo. LET'S EAT.

And for the big reveal...

Delicious!

The pizza turned out awesome. The crust is crispy, but not overdone. The dough has a unique taste to it, that reminds Paul a little of Gino's East crust with it's cornmeal-ey flavor. It's simple to make, and there are so many different toppings you can use. 

We've since made pizza several times, with a variety of toppings. Sometimes we scrap together what we have in the house and it ends up being pretty good (better than some sort of frozen meal -- that's for sure). Some ideas for your homemade pizza adventures:

• The aforementioned white pizza: thinly sliced red potatoes (using the mandoline is best, in my opinion), fresh or dried rosemary and mozzarella and Parmesan cheeses. IT IS SO GOOD. Try it. Try it now. 
• Red onion, tomato and basil -- topped with Romano (we didn't have mozzarella in house). Definitely a more tangy cheese, but quite good. You don't need as much cheese because of the strong flavor, but it was tasty.
• Paul has made pepperoni, red onion and cheese pizza with this dough, and absolutely loved it. He used a pepperoni sausage (versus buying pre-sliced pepperoni or those pepperoni slices in a bag) and sliced it himself. He said it was really good -- not the greasy stuff you typically think of when you eat pepperoni pizza.

Happy pizza making!

June 29: Risotto with Kale and Roasted Butternut Squash

I know. Kale and roasted squash? That sounds like I can't wait for cold weather to be here. Not (completely) true. I do love me some autumnal (!) meals, but I can hang on to warm weather for a while.


Anyways, back to the recipe. We had two half-bunches of kale (one from the produce box the week before) to use, and found this delicious looking recipe. 

Two kinds of curly kale!

Start by preheating the oven (to 425 degrees). Peel, seed and dice the butternut squash. Toss with a little olive oil, salt and pepper and roast in the oven for 30-40 minutes. Stir the squash every 10 minutes or so.

Next, blanch the kale. You do this by bringing a large pot of water to a boil, cooking the kale in the boiling water for about 4 minutes. Prepare an ice water bath, and once the kale has cooked for 4 minutes, pull it out and immerse it in the ice bath to stop the cooking. 

Side benefit of blanching: it retains such an awesome, bright color. 

Drain and squeeze out the kale. Coarsely chop once drained. 

Sous-chef Christine, working hard to prep everything. 

Begin to heat up the chicken stock. In a separate pan, add the remaining olive oil, and cook the onion for about 3 minutes. Add the minced garlic and salt, and cook for another minute. Add the arborio rice and cook until coated in the oil. 

The cubed squash is tender and ready to go!

Stir in the wine, and cook over medium heat stirring constantly. When the wine is almost evaporated, add in the kale and 1/2 of the squash. Start adding the stock, ladle by ladle. Stir in the stock completely before adding in another ladle of stock. 

It is laborious, but worth it. 

Continue to check the risotto as stock is added to make sure the rice does not become mushy. 

Once all but 1/2 cup of the stock has been incorporated, add in the remaining squash and the last 1/2 cup of stock. Stir in the Parmesan cheese and parsley, and remove from the heat. Add salt and pepper to taste, and serve. 

Bright and seasonal (a little early). 

The risotto was really tasty. Very different from the other risottos we have made (i.e. risotto with bacon and peas, and risotto with mushrooms) in terms of taste -- the vegetables are much milder that other ingredients that we have used before. It was nice and creamy without being terrible for you. I would definitely make this again, perhaps varying the vegetables to try some different combinations. The end of summer is prime for delicious squash!

June 23: Cornflake-Crusted Chicken Fingers

There are some days when I just don't feel like cooking anything adventurous. I know. Surprising. It is then that I turn to these quick and easy chicken fingers. I found this recipe several years ago in Fitness Magazine, and have probably made them 10 times. Probably not the most exciting recipe to follow, but it is quick, easy and better for you than regular chicken fingers.

Yes, Corn Flakes, I endorse you for this recipe. 

Basic Ingredients:
12 oz. skinless, boneless chicken-breast halves
1 egg, slightly beaten
1 tbsp honey
1 tsp mustard
2 cups cornflakes, finely crushed (I pour them in a Ziploc bag and crush with a rolling pin)
black pepper to taste


Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Cut chicken breasts into strips. Combine egg, honey, and mustard in one dish.

Honey mustard goodness. 

In another dish, stir together cornflake crumbs and pepper. Dip chicken strips into egg mixture, then roll in crumb mixture. Spread the chicken strips on a baking sheet.

No boot-shaped McNugget, but there are a couple fun shapes in there. 

Bake for 12 minutes or until chicken is no longer pink.

Crunchy goodness. 

The chicken strips are nice and crispy without all the extra fat from regular bread crumbs or from frying. They are delicious with many different sauces -- buffalo sauce, BBQ sauce, ranch, mustard, ketchup -- or all of them.

The butter and sour cream were for baked potatoes. But I bet they'd go good with these chicken fingers too. 

June 14: Ratatouille Salad with Quinoa

We had gotten some yummy looking zucchini in the produce basket, and thought we'd make a delicious vegetable ratatouille salad for dinner. We decided to add some chickpeas to liven it up, and made some quinoa to go underneath the salad. 

I got started trimming and cubing the eggplant.
 

See the bright green book in the background? It's become my go-to. You could play, "Find Mark Bittman's book in Christine's blog photos!" if you're really bored.

Add two tablespoons of oil, warmed to medium heat. Once the pan is hot, toss the eggplant into the pan, add salt, pepper and cook for about 10 minutes, until the eggplant is soft. 

I got to work getting the other ingredients prepped while the eggplant was cooking, and tossed some quick cooking quinoa on the stove (no exciting photos of that move).

Medium zucchini, small onion and medium tomato: CHOPPED.

Take out the eggplant and let it dry on some paper towels. 

Softened and seasoned.

Add the remaining 2 tablespoons of olive oil, and then add in the zucchini. Cook for about 2 minutes, then add in the onion and garlic. Cook this for another minute or two, then add in the chopped tomatoes and thyme (I also added a can of drained, rinsed chickpeas here). Cook everything down for just another minute, then pull off the heat.  Mix in lemon juice, salt and pepper.

Before mixing in the eggplant. So colorful!

Add the cubed eggplant, the vegetable mixture and the pan juices/dressing into one big bowl and mix thoroughly.

Warm, vegetable-y goodness.

The recipe says to let it cool to room temperature. I don't think we let it get that cold. Paul was busy working on taking the broken tv off the tv mount while this was going on (I was supervising, obviously), so we probably let it sit for about 10 minutes. Here is the salad on top of a bed of quinoa.

I'll need to have some ice cream to balance all these vegetables out.

This recipe was really easy to make, and very tasty. I'm sure you can make it with lots of different sides -- rice, pasta, a bed of spinach, etc. You could also top it with some feta or Parmesan. I imagine it's really good alongside some fish or meat as well, especially one that incorporates Mediterranean flavors. I liked that the vegetables still had some bite to them -- that they didn't fall apart or get too mushy while you were cooking them. 

I may have to make this one more time before all the summer vegetables are gone! Who can resist summer tomatoes and squash? Happy eating!

June 21: Steelhead Trout with Fennel and Celery Salad

After getting fennel in our produce basket, I was on the hunt for some halibut to go with it. No dice at Dominick's. Instead, we picked up some delicious looking trout. I wasn't sure how we could prepare it, but found this recipe online, which looked pretty simple.

Here, fishy fishy fishy!

The mixture that goes on the trout is made up of butter, paprika, lemon, barbecue sauce and cayenne pepper. What the what?!? That sounds really weird. We had some Sweet Baby Ray's in house, so I figured whatever happened -- it would probably still be pretty good. Or you dump more barbecue sauce on it and it's fine.

After mixing all of the components together, brush this on the trout ahead of time (you add more while cooking as well).

The sauce IS boss, so it can't go too wrong, right?

Alongside the fish, I found a recipe/article by my hero Mark Bittman that would take care of both the fennel and the celery that we had received in the produce basket. Even without the halibut. 

BOOM. Salad.

Bravely figuring out the fennel.

Bittman's recipe doesn't really give you quantities, so I eyeballed it. After following his directions to quarter the fennel and take off the hard outer leaves, I sliced it thin on the mandolin, and did the same with the celery. Add a TON of lemon juice, a little bit of olive oil, salt, pepper and some shaved Parmesan, and this guy is good to go.

All combined with some mood lighting.

Paul got to work on the grill. He put the fish on and cooked them for 10 minutes on a medium heat.

I wonder what our neighbors think, while we're taking 900 pictures of the grill.

He then brushed them with some of the remaining sauce, and cooked them for an additional 2 minutes on the grill. 

I know this picture looks similar to the first one, but it's cooked under there. Promise.

We cut the fish into normal sized portions, and ate it alongside the fennel and celery salad. 

Ooh, pretty.

The note alongside the recipe is totally true -- you wouldn't think this is good, but it really is! The fish was really good! The barbecue sauce is not overpowering -- the combination of ingredients has a nice flavor. 

The salad is quite refreshing -- the fennel has a licorice-like flavor (but not gross, I promise). Adding a lot of lemon juice and pepper really tones it down and blends well. The celery and fennel are similar in consistency, so they make for a nice crunchy bite. Plus, throw some Parm on it, and I'll probably like it anyways.

Update: we've gotten fennel again in our produce basket, and I made the same salad. Second round was just as good as the first!