Finally tried out the spaghetti attachment on my pasta maker! It was delicious and the process was reallyfun and satisfying, but ultimately it didn’t feel as special as the fettuccine. Maybe because I like my spaghetti more al dente? Maybe because of the dearth of other pasta shapes in Japan? A little of both, I think.

I’m sure I’ll use this attachment again for ramen (sourdough discard ramen recipe) and I’ve heard it’s also good for soba! I’m also curious to try an eggless/vegan version of this recipe (sourdough discard pasta)—I’m looking at a fewdifferentones and wondering if it’s as simple as it seems…

I haven’t done one of these in a while…

Brussel Sprouts!

One of my go-to vegetables because they’re flavorful and easy to adjust to any entre.

What you’ll need:

• Oil (I use olive)
• Honey
• Lemon juice
• Garlic salt
• Plastic bag big enough to hold your sprouts

Preheat oven to 350/ 175

Put the sprouts and lemon juice in the bag, add a tablespoon or so of honey and a couple dashes of garlic salt. Shake everything up until the honey dissolves then dump it in the pan. You can do this step in a bowl, I just have a thing with marinating in bags.

Top rack in the oven for 40-50 minutes. *EDIT* Cutting them in half lengthwise significantly reduces cook time but also cooks a lot of the fluids out of your sprouts. Played th with it, have fun.

The lemon juice and honey should start to carmelize on your sprouts and pan, but not burn.

Salt and/ or pepper if you’d like, but these are pretty tangy already.

Enjoy!

Roasted sweet potato salad

1. What is required:

• 2 sweet potatoes
• 1 small red onion
• 75 g. mixed greens
• 15-17 cherry tomatoes
• dill
• juice of ½ lemon
• salt and black pepper to taste

2. Preheat the oven to 200C/400 F. Peel and cut sweet potatoes into slices. Add salt and pepper. Roast sweet potatoes for 20 minutes.

3. Slice the onion and cut cherry tomatoes into halves or quarters. Chop the dill. Mix all vegetables with the greens. Drizzle the lemon juice.

4. When sweet potatoes are ready, take them out of the oven and let them cool down.

5. Add sweet potatoes to vegetables and mix well. I like to have a big bowl of salad in the fridge. It will serve me at least ½ of the week. I do not add any dressing to the whole salad. Instead, I will add it to a smaller portion for dinner or lunch. If you follow me for a while, you know that my favourite is tahini dressing. Add some water for the desired consistency. If you don’t like the taste of tahini (why and how ), add just olive oil or vinegar dressing (balsamic vinegar, olive oil, maple syrup, and mustard).

I vegetables. They are awesome but it’s essential to fuel your body with more nutritious food. Hence, I add beans, a beautiful source of plant based protein, to my ratatouille and cook it in one big frying pan instead of the oven. The oven > the pan but not when you try to save time.

It’s my way to cook it. Please don’t comment it’s not ratatouille. I added “kinda” in the title

1. What is required:

• 1 courgette*
• 1 aubergine*
• 1 bell pepper
• 1 can of rinsed red beans (or any beans tbh)
• juice of 1/3 lemon
• 1 small onion
• 2-3 garlic cloves
• 1 jar of tomato sauce
• 3 tbsp balsamic vinegar 
• dried oregano (optional)
• black pepper & salt to taste

* or 1 zucchini and 1 eggplant if you’re from the US 

2. The most difficult step of any meal : dice the onion and mince the garlic

3. Fry the onion and garlic cloves in a big frying pan for 3 minutes. Use around 1 tbsp oil if you don’t have a non stick frying pan.

4. Roughly chop all the remaining vegetables. Add them to the pan. Cook for 5 minutes.

5. Add beans, tomato sauce, spices, lemon juice, and balsamic vinegar. Mix well. Cover and cook for 20-25 minutes until the vegetables are tender.

6. Admire the full pan of colourful meal.

Don’t stare at the pan for a long time. It’s better to eat the meal warm although I ate it cold directly from the fridge because I didn’t have time for heating and it was still good.

Everything on the picture is not what you think. “Chicken” is sticky garlicky tofu and fried rice is cauliflower rice with vegetables. I hope you’re hungry and ready for simple vegan meal.

1. What is required:

For tofu:

• 1 block of plain tofu (180 g.)
• ¼ tsp salt
• 1/8 tsp black pepper
• 1 tsp chili powder (optional)
• 2 tbsp soy sauce
• 1 tbsp water
• 2 tsp rice vinegar
• 1 tsp garlic paste (or 1 garlic clove, minced)
• ½ tsp sugar
• spring onion and sesame seeds to garnish (optional)

For cauliflower rice:

• 450 g. frozen cauliflower rice*
• 1 red bell pepper
• ½ zucchini
• ¼ lemon juice

* if you cannot find frozen cauliflower rice, you can make your own in the food processor or use the cooked rice. In this case, better take leftover rice

2. Preheat the oven to 220 C or 420 F

3. Tear the tofu into medium sized chunks. Cover it with black pepper, salt and chili powder. Mix well. 

4. When the oven is ready, layer the tofu chunks on the baking sheet. Bake for 10 minutes.

5. While the tofu is baking, mix garlic paste, soy sauce, water, rice vinegar, and sugar. 

6. Now it’s time for multitasking The tofu is in the oven, start cutting your vegetables. Chop the bell pepper and zucchini into small cubes. By the way, I decided to use small onion heads from spring onions to fry with tofu so i sliced it as well.

7. After 10 minutes, remove the tofu from the oven. It will be crispy around the edges. Fry it in the frying pan with the sauce you mixed earlier. I added the sliced onion. I do not use oil when frying but if you don’t have a non-stick pan, fry it in oil.

8. I fried the tofu chunks for 8-10 minutes on low heat and topped it with green onion. I strongly believe Asian food and spring onion are married. Actually, spring onion is the indicator the food is Asian

9. In the same frying pan, fry the chopped bell pepper and zucchini for 3-4 minutes. Add cauliflower rice and cook for 5-6 minutes. Add lemon juice, mix well and cook for 1-2 minutes. I did not add spices because the cauliflower was with salt, pepper and other herbs. If you use your own home made cauliflower rice or normal rice, add salt, pepper, spices to your taste.

Voila! You are ‍ and…

and cheers!

Chicken Lyonnaise

I followed the recipe from Tasting History with Max Miller it was so good.

When I say this was fantastic I mean it was fantastic. I’m so glad his video popped up in my YouTube recommendations.

I’m so proud of how good the chicken turned out. I very rarely eat meat I cook, but this turned out so well I didn’t even think twice. The onions were so good. I let it cook a little longer than usual so they got jammy and good.

I cut the vinegar from a half cup to ¼ maybe less, like he said. I didn’t use demi-glace. Instead I used “Better than Bullion” it worked but it was SALTY (I used too much). I will use demi-glace next time. Don’t know why I didn’t since it the was two dollars cheaper. Now I have to find something to make to use up the rest of it. Chicken pot pie?

Also, I don’t cook with wine, I substituted with white grape juice and it worked just fine. I thought it would make it too sweet, it did not.

I need to find a store that sells those little carrots with the greens still attached because this meal was very brown needed that pop of color.

Next time I cook it I might add mushrooms.

Chicken and broccoli over rice with rye-whiskey peanut sauce. Phenomenal cooking from my partner. The whiskey was used to deglaze the cast iron after the chicken was done, and then those juices became part of the peanut sauce. A successful experiment!

We got the idea to use whiskey deglazing for sauce from Food Wishes.