What in the world is kimchi?

Hello Crushers!

One group of friends never seems to be able to have a Christmas party, so we started having a Chinese New Year party instead. While only a few Chinese dishes get made, it's mostly one big food party with handmade presents. There a sandwiches, egg rolls, hush puppies, slaw, cheese cake, beer and cheese dip and all sorts of crazy but delicious foods! This year, I decided to try something Korean: Kimchi Tuna Rice Patties. Sooooo goooood.

When my mom asked what I was going to make, I told her, and her first reaction was, "What in the world is kimchi?" Actually, I posted a picture of it on facebook and she asked that. Anyway...

From left to right: Chili paste, kimchi, sesame oil

Kimchi is like Korean sauerkraut. It's a cabbage-based condiment that has a vinegary sourness to it. It also has some shrimp and radish in there, so WARNING shellfish allergy people. I had a lot of fun going to buy it, too.

You see, you can't just buy kimchi at any old store. You need an Asian grocery or market. Fortunately, there is a grocery called Pacific Produce in Milwaukee, and let me tell you, it was amazing. My cousin, Caitlin, and her friend Danielle came along on this grocery field trip. I REALLY wanted to take out my camera and start snapping pictures of all the stuff I saw (and half I couldn't read), but I didn't want to be that girl. I also didn't want to get banned from the store. They had foods like jack fruit, frozen cuttlefish, and tofu in every shape and size.

The funniest part of this grocery trip was that I'm in the middle of an aisle entirely devoted to rice and rice noodles (there are that many kinds), a country music song came on over the radio. It was like East meets West in the rice aisle. I'm not saying that to be a jerk, I'm just saying that it totally threw me off-guard.

Anyway, here is my attempt at making these delicious tuna and kimchi snacks!
Kimchi Tuna Rice Patties
Ingredients:

1 cup kimchi chopped

1 (5oz, 145g) canned tuna, drained well (depending on your environmental stance, you may want to choose the wild caught, dolphin safe kind like I did!)

3 tablespoon kimchi juice (or as much as you can get out of the jar)

2-3 green onion, chopped

1 teaspoon sesame oil

1 tsp hot chili paste/sauce (optional)

4 cups cooked short grain white rice (my rice wasn't very sticky)

as many sheets of plain roasted seaweeds as you need

 

NOTE: buy a triangular rice shaper thingy like the other blog says. Mine worked OK in the cupcake pans, but they fell apart. Argh...

Directions:

Start your rice since that will take the longest. If you don't have a rice cooker (like me - I know!), follow the stove top directions.

Yes, it really is that bright red. Chop up those big cabbage chunks!

Chop up the kimchi on a washable surface. Throw it all in a pan and saute the kimchi for about 2 minutes or until it gets soft. Take those two minutes to try and scrub the red juice off your cutting board and hands. You'll get it off your hands, but you might as well throw the cutting board right into the dishwasher.

Once the kimchi is heated through, add the tuna, sesame oil, chili paste (optional) and chopped green onions. You'll want this to cook this all together until the mixture gets kind of dry. I have never used some of these ingredients before, but wow does it make your kitchen smell fantastic! Especially the roasty-toasty smell of the sesame seed oil!

The happy red spoon is happily stirring.

NOTE: This is where I totally veer off from how the Holly did it at Beyond Kimchee.

If you don't have the rice shaper thingy, hunt for something in your kitchen that could hold about a half cup of rice. Since I had to travel for two hours to get to the party with these snacks, I used cupcake tins because a) they make travel easy, b) it's about the right size, c) I have two of them, and d) they stack!

While letting the rice and tuna mixtures cool enough for handling, chop up your seaweed into strips about 1.5 inches by 5 inches. I just took the seaweed sheets and cut them in half and half again until they were about right.

This is before you put the rest of the rice on top.

In order to fill them, place a piece of seaweed across the top of one of the holes. Firmly, fill it half way with rice and make a little dent in the bottom so it's shaped like a bowl or nest. Put about a tablespoon of the tuna mixture into the dent/bowl/nest, but not too much that it hangs over the sides. Take more rice and firmly cover it up and then wrap in seaweed. If your rice is the right texture/stickiness, you will be able to pop those things out of the tins and serve them in cute little circles.

Cute little circles!
I ended up making 24 of these things. Can you believe it?

However, if you had some trouble with that, ahem, you're going to need a spoon and some patience. You can eat them cold and they taste pretty great, or if yours totally fell apart when you tried "popping" them out of the tins, just toss the insides of about three of these in a bowl, pop it in the microwave and eat it for dinner with a bit of soy sauce or more kimchi. Either way, it's hit!

Catch up, not ketchup: Buffalo Chicken Dip

Hi Crushers,
I'm sorry for the delay in posts. I would like to blame my cut finger for the inability to type up some of my latest kitchen happenings, but I didn't cut myself that bad...

Anyway, looking back at the past two weekends (has it been that long?!), I've had some really great food and I'm glad to share it with you! For the Superbowl, I made Buffalo Chicken Dip loosely based on this recipe from Skinnytaste.com.

Please note that cooking with hot sauce with a cut finger could lead to all sorts of disasters and swearing in the kitchen. Thanks to one of my husband's favorite shows, Swamp People, I have picked up on one of the character's sayings: "Dog it" instead of the other word that starts with a d.

Since I wasn't totally invested in either team and our group of friends are all really good cooks, we had a crazy smorgasbord of food. We had two types of guacamole, rice and seaweed snacks, jalapeno hush puppies (SO GOOD my cousin gave me the magazine that it was from), puppy chow/muddy buddies, shrimp with sesame, and all sorts of things. No one goes hungry at these parties. We enjoyed the food, the commercials and Beyonce. Who doesn't love a good Beyonce performance?

Buffalo Chicken Dip
Ingredients:
2 cups chopped cooked chicken (about two boneless, skinless chicken breasts)
1 tbsp-ish olive oil
1 8 oz. package of cream cheese (I used the low fat kind)
1 14 oz (possibly 16 oz, I forget...) tub of Greek Yogurt
1 cup-ish of hot sauce (I used Franks)

1 cluster of celery trimmed and chopped up into dip-able sticks

Directions:
Start getting a frying pan hot and heat the oil. Spread the oil around so your chicken doesn't stick to the pan. Cook the the chicken all the way through. No pink insides! I chopped my chicken up before I cooked it so that it would cook faster, but you can chop it up afterward too. Just be sure to let it cool down so you can handle it.

Lots of chicken!

In a large bowl, beat the cream cheese and Greek yogurt until it's smooth. Then, starting with about a half cup, mix in the hot sauce until you're at a level of spiciness that you can handle. It's important to know your crowd on this one otherwise if it's too hot, no one will eat it! My crowd included a few people who never break a sweat when eating ANYTHING. I ended up using a cup of the hot sauce. Some people said it made their eyeballs sweat and other people wanted more heat. Can't with them all!

Yes, it will turn that bright orange color!

Once the chicken is cooked and chopped up into small bits, stir in to the yogurt-cheese base. Stir thoroughly and serve with celery. You don't need to heat this up at all. I think the celery and the fact that it's cold help to bring the heat level down for people who can't handle a lot of spice.



Question: Which was your favorite commercial? Mine was a tie between the Budweiser Clydesdales, the Jeep/USO, and Ram Trucks "Farmer". All three of them made me choke up!

Kitchen Basics: First Aid for a minor cut

It happens to all of us. It even happens to fancy chefs on the Food Network (ironically, it happened to a chef on the show "Chopped"). You cut your finger while slicing some veggies and all of a sudden you are bleeding and you have to act. This may or may not have recently happened at our house to a certain blog writer that may or may not be writing this post.

Here are a few steps for what you should do if you cut yourself:

1. Remain calm. Hopefully, you don't faint at the sight of blood. If you do, you should be extra careful because you're going to need to get the bleeding to stop.
2. Stop the bleeding. Minor cuts and scrapes will stop bleeding on their own. However, if they don't, you should apply gentle, but firm pressure to the cut with a clean cloth or bandage for 20-ish minutes and elevate it if possible (above your heart). Do not grab whatever towel you just wiped lemon juice or a salty broth up with. That will hurt like heck and you'll be saying a few choice (four-letter) words about that. Also, do not keep checking to see if the bleeding has stopped because that just prolongs the whole process. If this doesn't work, you may need to see a doctor.
3. After you've gotten the wound to stop bleeding, clean it with clear water. Don't apply soap directly to the cut because that can really hurt. If there is something in the cut you may need to use a clean tweezers to remove whatever is in there. In my experience, the only that that was in a cut was some spices or bit of food, but that got washed away with the water.
4. I know some people who say to apply an antibiotic right away and some people say "let the air get at it". Well, according to the Mayo Clinic, you should use some, unless of course you're allergic to it. It helps to prevent infection.
5. Cover with a bandage (or make your husband go get you one while you stand there applying pressure to the wound). If you have to finish preparing a meal or were bleeding pretty good, you'll want to be sure and have the bandage on otherwise crud could get in the cut that you just cleaned. You also don't want to get anything in the food. Speaking of that, you may need to throw away any food that you got blood on and you should get a clean knife or whatever utensil you were using.
6. Keep the dressing clean and dry to prevent infection.
7. If any of these things don't work or if you have a big cut (deeper than a quarter inch or jagged, spurting blood, infected, etc), go see a doctor right away. You may need stitches or a tetanus shot.

Ways to prevent cuts in the kitchen:

1. Pay attention to what you're doing! 
2. Keep your knives sharp. I know this sounds counter-intuitive, but a sharp knife will slice things easier which means you won't have to apply as much pressure to the food. When you have to press down hard with a knife, you're more likely to slip.
3. When using a grater or mandolin slicer, make sure that you have it on the right setting for the food you are using and keep your knuckles out of the way! Make sure that you are on an even surface clear of slippery substances (water, oil, juice, etc.) Also, don't try to slice things over a pan of hot food. Can you imagine cutting your self and then dropping the grater in a pan of simmering food? Yeah, ouch. 
4. Keep a first aid kit near your kitchen for any "just in case" moments.

Be careful and cook on, Crushers!

Fun fact: before modern antiseptic/antibiotic creams like Neosporin, people sometimes used honey to clean wounds and keep infection away. It even helped clear up bee stings! Before trying this home remedy, please make sure that you aren't just smearing a honey product on your hand. If it's not real honey, you might have just spread corn syrup on a cut. Also, don't give honey to a child under the age of one because of the natural presence of botulinum endosphores. 

Stir Fry Fail

Morning Crushers!

Following our meal planning for the week, I made stir fry last night. I totally cheated and used frozen veggies, frozen shrimp and minute brown rice. I was SO hungry, that this was going to be a perfect meal ready in under thirty minutes full of lean protein, whole grains and veggies.

Well, what the heck?

I did this almost exact meal last week, except it had rice noodles in it last time. This week, the sauce was thin, the rice was weird, and it just wasn't the same! After running three miles in a gym and getting slightly dizzy (it's 30 laps), I was so, so hungry. The veggies were good and the shrimp were tasty, but the rice threw me off. Seriously? How do you screw up minute rice?

Hmm... Oh well. I still got lots of healthy food in one bowl. Plus, Steve made a pseudo apple turnover using leftover pizza dough. He kneaded sugar and cinnamon into the dough, spread it out over a cookie sheet, filled  half with apple pie filling and raisins, covered it with the other half of the dough, and baked it. It's like hand-held apple pie. WINNER!

How about you? Have you made stir fry?

Meals for the week

Hi Crushers,
I know I didn't have much to write about last week, but that's for two reasons: one, Steve did most (OK, practically all) of the cooking last week, and two, it was a rough week for my family with funeral preparations for my aunt. One more reason that I didn't cook last week was because it was exam week for Steve's school, so we didn't have as many after school commitments as usual. Also, he makes a killer spicy chili and it's never quite the same.

Hmm, I guess that's four reasons. Anyway, we're getting back on track sharing the prep, cooking/baking, and shopping this week.

Here is the plan for the week, so stay tuned!
Monday: Stirfry
Tuesday: Leftover Chili (with homemade bread sticks from this post) and making some sort of treat for Steve's card night with the guys since I really don't have to cook dinner. Thank you to whoever invented the microwave!
Wednesday: Pasta with chicken tenders from my freezer meal class
Thursday: Chicken and Dumplings
Friday: Up for grabs! Pizza? Fajitas? Who knows...

Coming up this weekend is the SUPER BOWL! Not only is this THE night for NFL fans (unlike the pro bowl...), commercial fans and Beyonce fans, but it is a fun food night. We are going to be attending a party at my cousin's house which should be exciting for a number of reasons:

1. Her husband is from San Fran, so we've all become honorary 49ers Fans.
2. She is a good cook and has invited lots of fun foodie people to the party. 
3. I'm betting that at least 3 people have e-mailed/called/texted her brother/my cousin to make his "bacon-wrapped, chicken bites of holy cow that's spicy". 

I think I'm going to make one healthy option like a spicy buffalo dip with celery sticks and Greek yogurt and then one that is loaded with cheese and such. Any requests? Please write them in the comments!

Freezer Food Workshop

Disclaimer: I was not paid to review the Wildtree Freezer Meal workshop that I attended Monday night. All of the opinions I make in the following blog post are my own. I just happen to like these products.

Good Morning Crushers!

Monday night I attended a Wildtree party where we prepped 10 meals to store in the freezer. We used Wildtree products to season various meats. We got recipes for all of the meals, so later on I can just pull a bag out of the freezer, thaw it and cook it according to the directions. Easy peasy.

Well, sort of. First you pay for a bunch of products that will be ready and waiting for you to use. Then you buy all the meat (or meat substitutes) and prep them. We had our class on a Monday, so I shopped and prepped on Sunday. It took me a little while to find all of the ingredients, but the nice thing was that you could substitute things that are already in your freezer!

Once you are done slicing or cubing the meat, you put them all in labeled bags so they match the recipes. I felt so organized after this, I practically patted myself on the back! Each meal is supposed to have 4-6 servings, so I split them into two and had a bag 1A and 1B and so forth. You just have to remember that if you use a frozen meat (like shrimp or the roast I had sitting in my freezer), you have to keep it frozen. You really shouldn't thaw something more than once.

When we got to the workshop, everything was all set out for us and there were more ingredients to use that we didn't have to buy. We followed some really simple directions (I split mine between the two bags), and by the end of the night, I had a cooler full of food! 20 meals! I don't think I'll need to go shopping for any meat for months! I even came home with a bunch of product since you don't use it all.

Here are some great tips I learned:

1. When filling a big freezer bag, put it in a bowl once you have a heavy ingredient in it so that it stays up right while you fill it. Or, as my friend Mary did, use two wine bottles to prop open the top of the bag when you fold the opening over it.
2. If you want to season ground beef/turkey/chicken, putting it in bags or in a big bowl and squishing it all around works great. You meat will be seasoned through and through!
3. You can keep a list of all the meat or prepared meals in your freezer so that you know what you've used and what you need to replenish instead of digging through your freezer. Whenever I do this I end up going, "huh, look at that..." I think we will have a lot less freezer burnt foods.
4. Cooking is why you learn fractions in grade school. Sometimes you need to double them and sometimes you need to divide them.
5. Prepping all your food when you get home from the grocery takes a little while, but is totally worth it. Thanks to a fun food blog on CNN called Eatocracy, you can find more ways to waste less food!

Comfort Food

Hi Crushers,

I find it unique that when major life events happen, people make you food. New baby? Have a casserole! You're moving? Let's have pizza and beer while you pack. New promotion? Let's go get drinks! Death in the family? Here's a lasagna.

Well, I just got news that my aunt, who is also my godmother, passed away today from battling with liver cancer. Although I'm a Christian and I know that she is celebrating eternal life in heaven, it still sucks.

If you could all do me a favor, go hug your aunts. And your uncles. And your siblings. And your parents and everyone.

Thank You.