She: Cous-Cous Method

When my mom told me she was buying cous-cous for meals, I promised to add this post. Mark showed me a great way to make cous-cous very fast and simply, and even better, virtually mess-free...my favorite! This method just steams the cous-cous in a ziplock baggy, which you can then chuck into the fridge inbetween meals. Get: 1 cup cous-cous, 2tsp olive oil, 1.5 cup boiling water, 1 small cucumber, 1/2 onion, small handful of mint (or basil), 1/2 tsp cyanne, 1/2 tsp salt, and fresh pepper.

Thats the most basic list of ingredients. Everything than can be cut/diced, including the mint, should be. Put the cous-cous and the oil in the baggie first. Then add all the veggies and the salt/peppers. Pour in the boiling water and seal the bag. Let it sit for a few minutes, and voila! I personally add some apple and/or roma tomato (but add those after it steams), but dried cranberries or raisins are also nice, especially with mint! This is very healthy as a side dish, and a nice alternative to something mayo-heavy like coleslaw. Best of all, besides the knife and cutting board, there's nothing else to wash. :)

She: Noodles in Kauai

Hamura Saimin Stand in Lihue was one of the best things about chowing down in Hawaii. I lived overseas in Asia growing up, and in my school we didn't have tater tots and chocolate pudding--we had noodles and fried rice. And lord do I miss the noodles. We have lots of vietnamese restaurants here in sacto, but I don't think any of them make their own noodles...there's a zang to the yellow noodles that is lacking, and the consistancy is wrong. Well, Hamua's had fresh noodles, and I practically turned into a puddle slurping them down.

Another fabulous treat while we were there, only served once or twice a week, were the pork filled rice buns. Buck fifty a peice for a softball sized bun-o-heaven. We ate there a day before we were married, and came back the day after for more! Now, I have to say, I rarely put in much effort to the photos on this site...photography is "work" and I try to keep this blog casual and fun, which means to serious lighting or equipment. The photo I have here shows an exception to the rule--we took Domo with us everywhere on our Hawaiian wedding trip and he hung out for all the snapshots. Domo rocked the noodle shop (snicker). Everyone talked about the lilikoi (passionfruit) pie they had, but I thought it was sooo light I couldn't hardly taste any passionfruit, let alone zippy tartness, so that was a disappointment. BUT, the overall experience was great, and at 4.25 per noodle bowl, an absolute steal and trip (for me) down memory lane. If you aren't sure if you'd had great noodles, ah, buy a plane ticket to Kauai and try these guys out!

He: Lilly's Pizza

When I was little there was a couple of meals that just stuck as things that my family always made. The two things that stick out in my head that my excelled at were baked chicken with noodles and steamed broccoli, and spaghetti with either meat sauce or white clam sauce. I can't say that I have fond memories of the chicken, although I probably lived off the noodles...and probably would to this day, if it wasn't for the Atkins diet and all of those years thinking that carbohydrates were bad. Unlike the chicken, I do have very fond memories of the spaghetti and clam sauce (or meat sauce), and today I can make those sauces with no effort at all. If given the chance to relive those memories of the family around the table with spaghetti and sauce, and garlic bread that would make even garlic farmers blush is something that I'd love to be able to do.

Later, once I was living on my own, trying to survive as a post college, semi-lost adult I attempted to develop my palate in Raleigh. I developed a love for a few distinct spots that my college buddies and I seemed to spend way too much time in. One of those classic spots for us was this little eclectic pizza place called Lilly's. The whole place is just a hodgepodge of styles, with old sections of cathedral ceilings just lying on the floor, and a bliniking sign near the bar that just says 'wow'. Even with the hodgepodge they make the best pizza that I think that I've ever eaten. The last time that I was able to enjoy a slice was about 7 years ago.

Thanks to by best friend Steve, and his new bride Mary, Brandy and I got the opportunity to enjoy a slice from this fantastic little place. Here are a few shots of the place, and what doesn't look like an incredible pizza....but the thing that I say when people ask is that the dough they make is soo good that you'd almost like to eat the crust..and then maybe the rest. Trust me this is something that if you ever make it to Raleigh, you have to try at least once.

He: Roasted Summer Vegetable Salad

There are some of the great things that are here in Sacramento. One of those great things is the local farmer's market. Not to get into detail about the market, I will just say that it's year round and has all the good stuff that is growing in the immediate area. I LOVE to go to the market. Really this is all beside the point of this, which is this roasted summer salad that I threw together last night.

The original base idea for this is born from a cookbook written by a mentor of mine, Scott Peacock. He wrote this beautiful cookbook that you really should check out sometime called The Gift of Southern Cooking (click here for Amazon book link) His is based on roasted okra and heirloom tomatoes, and shallots and field peas (which are completely not available around here...damn). Mine is based on what mood hit me while we were at the market.
The only things that I would probably change about this salad are, that I would like it to be a little spicier (Brandy doesn't do spicy food well, and I can always make something hotter just for me), and I wish that the string beans at the market weren't soo bloody expensive (they were going for $4+ per pound...highway robbery if you ask me). Well here's the recipe the way that you see it pictured.

2 lbs Small summer squash(crookneck, pattypan, zucchini, whatever looks nicest)...just make sure they're small...big will be too starchy
1 lbs Red torpedo onion
1 lbs Sugar Snap peas
6 ears yellow corn
1/2 C. Fish sauce
2 Tbsp. soy sauce
1 Tbsp. peanut oil
4-5 coarse grinds of black pepper

Roast the corn still in the husk at 350F for 30 minutes, then cut the corn off the cob. Slice the onion into rings 1/4" thick, toss with the summer, squash snap peas and oil. Put on cookie sheet and roast at 500F until squash is lightly browned (maybe 5 minutes). Cool and toss all together with soy/fish sauce.

He: Oh toaster how I shall continue to long for you...

Yeah, I didn't get the Dualit toaster that I'd been asking for over the last couple of months. How much joy would I have really gotten out of the thing? Would it have become the latests kitchen albatross like our yogurt maker? We may never know. What we do know is that Berkeley is a fantastic place that has an incredible love for food. We also know that something as simple as a little disk of bread dough can bring me back to my childhood. More on this last part later...

We went to Berkeley for my birthday, because we really needed to get out of this town(which seems to only excel and being spectacularly mediocre). A wonderful woman that used to work with me over at the coop, Jill, gave us this great little map of all of her favorite spots to go while in Berkeley. Why follow the map of someone that could be completely MAD!?...what the hell...what do we know of this place...besides how bad could it be? She listed this fantastic little Jewish deli that we plan to go and check out next time that we're there...Chez Panisse, and this place called the Cheese Board Collective.

I've never been anywhere that had such an incredible selection of cheese. There's this amazing little bar in Georgetown that has 700 some odd beers, but a place that probably has that many cheeses?! unhead of.....and they let you taste ANYTHING(definitely not a possibility with the beer joint). [By the way the beer place in Georgetown is called The Brickskellar(sp.) if you ever make it over to our nation's capital and need to find the Mecca of beer.] Everything about this place just made me happy..from the board proclaiming all of the cheeses that they had available that day(as you can see from the pic, you almost can't read them all...there's just too damn many), to the breads that were being baked perpetually while we were there....to the incredible pizza shop that they run a couple of doors down. We were in love with this place as soon as we walked by it. Yeah...we were famished by the time we got to Berkeley, thanks to a rediculous traffic jam in Sacramento that stranded us for 4 HOURS....so we went for the pizza first.

I LOVE this little place. They have the concept of what a restaurant should be down pat. Offer just one thing to eat. Yeah...screw the Friday's or Applebees, or whatever concept you want..of offering 85 bazillioin badly made things and just do 1 thing great. The one pizza that they were offering that day was mozzarella, feta, roma tomatoes, lemon juice, lemon zest, olive oil, and cilantro. We ordered a 1/2 pie and ate the whole thing(just barely)...and it was worth every last remaining bite. At just $9 for that half it was also a really good deal. I could continue to wax poetically about this place for at least a couple more paragraphs, but Brandy would kill me for making this post way too long...so I'll stop.

I know that Brandy was just overwhelmed by all of the cheese at the main shop. (When loading the blog Brandy writes in this thought: I looooooove cheeeeeeese). Their selection was very impressive....okay...it was too much for me too (and I know a good bit about cheese...although most of my knowledge is in American atrisanal cheeses, and Italian cheeses....with highlights in just a few of the bigger known ones of the world). They had a huge selection of foreign cheese, with just a little bit from bay area producers(which is a little disappointing. You'd think that with Chez Panisse right across the street from them that they'd be pushing local with a vengeance too???...hmm). I tried to steer things towards cheese that I thought that Brandy might like(my personal tastes and hers are not always the same...I like having the richness of a soft ripened cheese with the sharpness of bacterial bloom in the background, she tends to like things a little less aggressive). (Again, Brandy interjects: I think my tastes are generally MORE aggressive with hard cheeses like sharp, cave aged gruyere's where most of his hard cheeses are...milder. He just goes more tangy with soft cheeses) So I tried to let her pick out all of the cheese...mostly because I was completely enamored with the smile and the gleam in her eyes as she tried each new cheese. The woman that was helping us was very gracious, very friendly, incredibly helpful..and completely unlike what we would have found in Sacramento, very polite. Overall it left such an increbly positive feeling in us for the whole experience. We just can't wait to go back.

Okay, so what was the point about the little dough round that sparked memories of my childhood? Well while we were stuck in traffic..listening to the radio...something in my head thought back to living in Chicago and to this weird little Jewish bread thing that I hadn't had since leaving there. They're called bialys, and they're just little rounds of dough with some ingredients on top of them...kind of bagel-shaped, but without the hole. I can remember living in Chicago and going with the family out somewhere to a shop that just made these things and nothing else. They'd have every topping under the sun on them...but the only ones at that point in my life that I wanted had sauce and cheese, just like a pizza. As I was thinking about these little disks while we sat in traffic...I tried to come up with the word for what they were called(simply so that I could try and look them up on the internet..and maybe make them someday)...and it just hit me. Coincidentally...someone out there remind me to make them and I will do it...and post the results...with troubleshooting tips. it was the very last food that I thought that I'd find 2000 miles away from when I'd had them last. It was the last thing that I'd thought that I'd have 24 years since the last time that I'd had them. it was this stupid little round of dough, topped with roasted onion and poppy seeds that brought me closer to childhood than anything has in recent memory.

Thank god for Berkeley. Thank god for the Cheese Board Collective on Shattuck in Berkeley. Thank god for bialys, and thank god for those great childhood memories of Chicago.

She: Adjectives and icecream

Well, first I must say that Mark has about three blogs in the works filled with yummy recipes, but he hasn't finished them for some *lame* reason...But I now have this fabulous tale for you, and a promise that many recipes are in the works...we've been making our own preserves, veggie salads and other creative foodstuffs. So please be patient.

Mark and I are running a tad low on summer funds for fun, so we decided to do something cheap that we've been meaning to for a while: hunt good ice cream in town. You see, we left Atlanta JUST as we'd found the best gelato shop in town (What's the Scoop, right next to Alon's bakery). Now we are completely spoiled, having tasted quality. Sigh. So first, I wanted to get a sandwich so I didn't go completely piggy at the ice cream parlor, so we went to Bernardo's to split a grilled ham and cheese. It used to be that Bernardos served a fabulous grilled ham and cheese on a long slice of bread with warm tomatoes and a side of fries. Hmmmm. So I ordered the same thing I have in the past, but my sandwich comes out...and its not grilled. Infact, besides having ham and cheese on it, its nothing like the old sandwich--this new fiasco is drenched in mayo and stacked with lettuce, with a soft bun replacing the buttery, grilled bread. I look at the waiter and say "I'm sorry, I ordered a grilled ham and cheese?" to which I get an explination that the menu has changed, and that this IS the grilled ham and cheese. I protest. It ISN'T GRILLED. Ah, but the ham is, I'm told. The way this usually reads in the normal world is Grilled (ham and cheese) sandwich. Meaning, grilled sandwich. But no, now at Bernardo's it means ham thrown on a skillet til luke-warm...with some cold cheese, on a bun. UTTER CRAP! Don't use adjectives if you don't know how. As a consumer, I find this misleading and just wrong, considering they have, in the past, actually grilled the sandwich.

Well. After my mis-described sandwich, we move further downtown to Gunther's shop. There are pictures inside to prove it really hasn't changed much in the last 30 years or so, and I almost got one of their fruit freezes--they really do shave the ice right there, and they sandwich two scoops of shaved ice with a bit of vanilla icecream. Yum. But we wanted to see what these guys were made of, so Mark got two scoops: Butter Brickle and Mocha Almond Fudge, and I got Black Raspberry Chip and Chocolate in waffle cones. The cone was good, and didn't drip or get soggy...important when you're downing the sweet stuff. I think Mark preferred the butter brickle, and though the black raspberry was good, it was the old-fashioned chocolate that was amazing. The ice cream didn't have any ice chips in it and was nice and smooth. The service was good, and I kept wanting to go photograph the malts and bannana splits coming out for other people. The food was PRETTY. Its also local, friendly and cheap, so I'll be going back soon.

She: Noodle House

I have to say, I'm addicted to vietnamese noodles and grilled meat. LOVE it. I never lived there, but I did live next door in Thailand, and depending on what vendors you ate at, there were some similarities--there's a thai version of pho soup and all that jazz. Anyways. When Mark and I moved to Sacramento, we were completely bummed by the lack of fab mexican or new american cuisine. Its what we lived on in Atlanta. (but we are still looking around here!) Instead, we found that while the Sacramento version of salsa leaves a bad (read watery) taste in our mouths, the noodles in this town rock.

Noodle House is one of my favorite places in town. Its a little joint in the strip mall over on Madison and Manzanita in Citrus Heights--behind the Starbucks, Lyons, etc. Its just "Noodle House." But it IS authentic, and the staff is super friendly. They do know me, and I always sit at "my" table (little embarassed at being such an obvious devotee), but even before they knew me, I was always greeted and seated sweetly by a soft spoken Vietnamese lady. And anyone who serves there is just as gracious, too. That goes a LONG way with me.

Anyways, I went there with my friend Erika, and we started off with fried wantons in ginger sauce. They use *real* wanton wrappers--meaning they are really thin and crispy. They use these on their imperial rolls (aka spring rolls), too. Any time I get a spring roll or wonton with a thick wrapper, I'm a) disappointed and b) suspicious that they actually bought them premade. Thats usually what I find in those situations.

While we were chomping on these badboys, we were also drinking the complimentary hot tea that comes with any meal there. We ended up ordering two different versions of the rice noodles--she got grilled beef and I got the chicken. I've had them all, and all of the meat there is moist. This meal comes in a bowl with a side of a cucumber/pickled carrot/lettuce salad that I just mix in with the noodles. The noodle bowl is too big for me to finish unless I'm really full, and if you just get the basic its under 6 bucks! The only thing is...if you go there often enough (as I obviously do) you reaaaally get to know the recycling elevator music they play, but with everything else they've got going, it doesn't phase me in the least.

She: Luccas with sole

Today we went to Lucca for lunch. When we went in, at first we thought the place was dead--there was one table filled. Then we were asked if we wanted to be seated outside, and behold! Almost every seat was packed. Now, the owners of Lucca's own Roxy, too, which we've had very mixed experiences for... so we weren't sure what we were getting into.

The first thing we found though, was that the atmosphere was great outside. There were a few water fountains in the back, with lemon trees and other vegetation to obscure its proximity to other buildings downtown. Our waiter was (for a change) timely and actually knew the specials. We each ordered one: Mark had the open-faced albacore tuna sandwich topped with boiled egg and a side of fries. I had the Petrale sole fillet with watercress and mashed potatoes. We also ordered the Myzithra cheese flatbread, which came with a tasty lentil and garlic dip, olive pesto dip, as well as olives.

My sole was fabulous. It was delicately sauteed, and covered in a red cream sauce which matched without overwhelming the fish. The mashed potatoes were rich and buttery, and the entire dish was presented prettily, as well. We passed on desert--nothing really jumped out to either of us, and we were comfortably full. The only thing I have to say is...the waiter put down the bill RIGHT in front of Mark. Now, in our enlightened day and age, it should be common practice to put it between a couple. As a woman, I balk at the idea that if I'm with a man--regardless of his age or relationship, seventy percent of the time the bill is given to him. I HATE that. Its a sexist assumption that "the man pays." It may be chivalrous for a man to offer to pay, (or heck, ANYONE else to pay) but not for the waiter to make that assumption. Especially since, like today, the meal went on MY card. I mean...that isn't smart as I am the tipper, as well. :P But, the food was great, atmosphere relaxed and sophisticated.

I did start thinking on the way home about how to make my own fabulous fish--I never make fish at home, it seems, and as summer comes I'd like a few lighter meals in the week. So I scrounged up a few recipes and came up with this:

Ingredients:
Get 1 or 2 lbs of sole, or even a flounder, I cup of flour, an egg, a few pinches of salt and pepper, 1-2 cups of tempura crumbs, olive oil, butter.

Instructions:
• Pat the fish to dry with paper towels.
• Roll the fish in flour, then dip into beaten egg. Make sure to take off any excess egg.
• Roll gently in tempura crumbs.
• Place on a plate in the fridge and let it sit for an hour.
• When hour's up, recoat with more crumbs.
• Heat 1 tbs of butter and 1tbs of oil in the pan.
• GENTLY place the fish in the fan, and saute fish on both sides til golden brown. Use medium-high heat, for around 5 minutes each. You must be gentle when you flip the fish over, or it'll break up into a few sections.

If you'd like, once the fish is cooked you can squeeze some lemon or some other citrus onto the fish before serving.