zanthess | Entries tagged with cooking

Had some leftover rice from "testing" our old rice cooker the night before, and hub was hungry, so I thought I'd give cooking some fried rice a shot.

I put in about 2-3 cups rice, 3 green onions, 1/2-3/4 cup sprouts, 2/3 cup tofu, 3 eggs, and a bunch of mushrooms.

I sauteed the mushrooms in a little bit of oil. When they were halfway cooked, I threw in the tofu and some watered down shoyu sauce. I cooked it until the mushrooms looked all squishy.

I then added the sprouts, rice, and some more shoyu. I bunched up the ingredients in the pan up to the side and then cracked the eggs in the middle, mixing to scramble them. Once they were cooked, I just mixed everything together and turned up the heat to get some frying action.

Oh, and I added the green onions right before I finished frying.

It turned out fantabulous!

Not only that, but I found out that the hub doesn't much care for fried rice, AFTER the fact that he ate an entire bowl-ful!

He also asked me if I added chicken.

Musta done good with the flavor ^_^

So I decided to "culture" myself and make mochi. OMG....

So freaking tired right now. I have a towel around my neck, and my glasses continue to fall off I am so sweaty.

Reasons why mochi is so labor-intensive and hard to make
1. Mochi is sticky.
2. Mochi is very sticky
3. MOCHI IS (*&)#(&^$*&%^@$ STICKY!

Need I say more?

On the upside, only had one total loss (one burst open completely), I was able to "fudge" it and cover it in sesame seeds (I like them that way). I won't ever use food coloring again unless it's in the water first. I'll post pictures later.

I'm still pretty darn proud of myself ^_^

P.S. I don't know what all the hubbub about azuki bean paste is. I loved my first bite! Only issue I had is the mochi used was a bit sweet and made me sick. I'm thinking I'll go buy some azuki and make some icecream sometime. :D

Made some twice baked potatoes today. I haven't made them in a long time because they take virtually FOREVER, but are so worth it.

I'm really enjoying cooking and I think we're saving with me cooking from scratch as well.

Went to a funeral for a daughter of friends of my mom and dad. It was a bit strange because she was the same age as me, and it was the youngest memorial I've been to. Last funeral I went to was my father's.

I think there's a lot I don't want to deal with, but death for me doesn't seem so ending. I know there's something else out there. It's hard to describe. I guess I'm trying to say that when my time comes, I won't fear it, and will be ready.

The chicken turned out fantastic! It ended up being sweet BBQ chicken because I forgot to put lemon juice in the marinade, but it carmelized wonderfully and kept in all the juices, so chicken was kinda crunchy on the outside, and juicy on the inside.

I also boiled some corn in sugar water to get more of the sweet flavor the corn has, and I cheated and bought a foil bag of garlic bread.

Jake wants to take my mix and make it more tangy, so we'll see where more experimentation goes.

It felt good to have a homecooked meal again. Nothing out of a box can taste that good.

So breaking down barriers in my head isn't easy. It's like I have a bunch of chinese people building all these damn walls, and I have to keep going on raids and knocking them down. I think they're getting tired of building walls because every day as I try new things, I gain more confidence and get more excited about life. This has really shown in my cooking.

I know I've talked about this many many times before, but *gives raspberry* it's my journal and it's nice to look back and see how my thoughts change.

When I first started cooking as a kid, measurements had to be exact. I wouldn't do a recipe if it required a pinch or a dash of something. Everything had to be measured perfectly. If a recipe called for mixing for 45 seconds, I had a timer running.

This is not a healthy way to cook, and it pretty much doubles prep-time.

A few nights ago, I decided that I "needed" some cheddar biscuits, like the ones at Red Lobster. Unfortunately, the only measuring cups I could find were in metric. I began to panic, wondering how in the hell I was going to make something with metric measurments and a recipe in non-metric.

It's at this point that I either panic and give up, or push ahead and discover new things about myself. Luckily, I was feeling adventurous.

I realized that there was an exact same percentage difference between 1 cup and 1/2 cup, and 100ml and 50ml, it was all about ratios of ingredients! I know it's kind of a "duh" thing, but didn't occur to me until this moment.

The biscuits turned out fantastic as always.

The next night, I was hungry for them again, but this time the measuring cups were currently being washed in the dishwasher, so I eyeballed the entire recipe... and it turned out just as delicious! I was pretty damned proud of myself.

Now I'm gearing up the Mongolians in my head for another attack tonight. I've been craving some grilled drumsticks with a special sauce that my dad made when I was little. I remember most of the ingredients, and I'm hoping the rest will come to me as I make it.

Funny thing is, I don't feel afraid like I normally do when I cook something myself for the first time. I'm excited, and will be so thrilled if I can get the flavor like my dad used to.

A lot of this is really to help me gear up for the baconfest next weekend. Almost everything I'm making then will be done with really no recipes, and I could use more confidence.

Will post an update on how things go tonight. 'Ta.

I really need to start actively posting again. Work has really sucked up all my energy. It will even more next week (doing nearly 30 hours of overtime) trying help another team catch up. I'm excited to help out, and also meet some new people.

Made bacon cookies again. This time I used yellow cake mix. It's teh awesome.

Our wii is having issues playing discs. I'm taking it to work tomorrow to get it fixed so that nothing goes wrong for the Super Smash Brawl party I'm throwing this weekend.

And I'm watching the cat compulsively paw at a soft blanket. It's the only one she does it on. We call it "making biscuits"

I'm cooking a nice sit down dinner for a friend of mine at work and my fam, will post on how that goes. I've really gotten into glancing at a recipe, and then making my own recipe up.

Oh! I forgot! I made a quiche, two actually. They turned out super good. Of course, 'cause it had bacon in it.

Lots of people have been hounding me for the recipe I used for my bacon cookies. It's really simple: Add bacon to your favorite cookie recipe to make it moar bettar. But if you are a part of the unimaginative, here's what I did...

Andrea's Chocolate cake mix chocolate chip bacon cookies

Ingredients:

1pkg. chocolate cake mix
1 lg. egg
1/4 C. water
1/4 C. vegetable oil
1 C. chocolate chips
1pkg. bacon (preferrably maple cured or something sweet.)

Directions:

Fry bacon to preferred done-ness.

Heat oven to 350 degrees.

Combine cake mix, egg, oil, and water. Beat until well blended.

In a blender (or food processor) on pulse, blend enough bacon into "bacon bit" size pieces to fill 1/4-1/3 cup (depending on how "bacony" you want it").

Drop by teaspoon about 1 inch apart onto greased cookie sheet.

Optional: cut a chunk of bacon off of a strip and push it onto the top of the cookie for added effect.

Bake for 15 minutes or until done. Makes about 4 dozen. (Note: Enjoy all the leftover bacon while baking!)

Find someone who's never had bacon in their cookies and make their day better!

nummies, that is.

I read a few weeks ago an article about someone putting bacon in cookies, with surprisingly fantastic results. I decided to give it a go. Even with the strange stares of my mother and guffaw-ing of my husband, not to mention the strange feeling of putting bacon into a blender, they turned out super freakin' fantastic! So good in fact I'm tempted to make them again.

I will post pics of happy mouths after tomorrow when my bacon cookies will be unveiled at lunch.

Since this is my last week at work, and I'm not going to have another chance to cook eggyrolls for a while, I am offering this to anyone in the Utah area that knows me.

If you want some eggrolls, let me know! I'm going to be cooking up atleast 120-150 of them for the drive to WA (awesome snacking food), but when I make them, I always go overboard. We really don't need this many, and if you want some, there'd be no cost for it. Just hangin' out with me and giving me real critiques on how well I did.

This'll be my 4th time cooking them (3rd time by myself), and i was taught buy a friend that grew up in Thailand. I've stayed pretty true to her recipe, but have added a bit of my own influence as well.

To all you in WA: I promise I will make more when I get there after we settle in.

To all you in other places: tough noogies, come and visit me!

Well everyone, I outdid myself last night.

I like to make meatloaf about once a month because: one, it's horridly easy to make; and two, my husband goes ape over it and seems to be more snuggly after a good hearty meal.

I decided to try a few things, since Jake has expanded my culinary palate. Normally I have to follow strict instructions and make sure that everything goes in right, but this time I kicked up my meatloaf a notch by putting cajun seasonings in the loaf, and I put a bit of Cattleman's BBQ sauce in with the topping. It worked out beautifully because the topping was always a bit too tart, and the loaf was too bland. Match that with some greenbeans on the side sprinkled with Vegetable Magic (actual brand. try it, we swear by it!), and a loaf of garlic bread and it's a feast!

I even brought some to work with me for leftovers, now I have to bring some more tomorrow to share with others so they can try it.

Oh SNAP! Zanth is becoming more domesticated!