Brie and Apple Pancake Stacks

The Harrington household has one ... or two ... or more, favorite food ideas/concepts/traditions. One is that "everything is better with an egg" (Mike is adamant that he will one day take this to the limit and enjoy some ice cream with a fried egg on top, we'll see how it goes). Another favorite is anything that invovles Brie and apples. Our friend Mark made an appetizer of Brie surrounded with sugary, cinammony apples which would be heated in the oven then dug into with pieces of baguette bread - it is always a heavenly experience.

You may recall our Grilled Brie and Apple Sandwhiches.

Recently, we had pancakes.

Rather than topping with syrup...

I sauted some apples with brown sugar and cinnamon

sliced some brie

Threw it all on a plate and

voila! Delicious-ness for a breakfast themed dinner.

Spinach and Lentils

I loved everything about this dish. Seeing these photos have stirred a craving in me which I did not expect! Lentils are delcious! Cumin is fantastic! Spinach and tomatoes - stellar! Tomatoes especially. I mixed in about a cup or so of tomatoes into my bowl of spinach and lentils.

I more or less used this recipe from allrecipes.com

Ingredients and Directions:

Saute some onion or the whites of a couple of green onions plus two or three garlic cloves in some veggie oil. Add about 2 cups of water (may need to add more as lentils cook) and 1 cup of lentils as well as some salt, cumin, and pepper. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to simmer, cover and cook until lentils are soft adding water or broth as needed. In the last five minutes add as much fresh spinach as will bring your heart content. Top with fresh, deliciously sweet tomatoes and enjoy on the couch next to the one you love the most.

Beer Bread

Desiring to invite our co-teachers over for a traditional holiday meal, Mike offered to buy me an oven for our Korean apartment. Honestly, I was committed to making do without. But, now that there's an oven in this apartment, I must admit I am THRILLED. Something about cooking AND baking brings me such great joy. Providing friends and co-workders foods which I honestly believe in, which I poured effort, thought and serious love/excitement into making is a ridiculous pleasure for me. Therefore, thanks to GMarket, Korea's equivelent to eBay, we had ourselves a beautiful little convection oven waiting to serve my baking needs.

The first baked good?

Beer Bread. This recipe to be exact.
It seriously is the easiest bread recipe EVER.

I will make it often.

Tomato, Spinach and Mozz Omelet

Tomatoes here are FABULOUS! Incredibly sweet, I could eat a bowl full with chopsticks and be a happy camper! I can also whisk up some egg, throw in some spinach, green onion and the tasty tomato morsels, pour into a hot skillet cook through, throw in some mozzarella cheese and enjoy a giant, beyond satisfying omelet. I highly recommend it!

(I wanted to try the egg roll concept to get it on video, but tomatoes and spinach are too heavy of ingredients to conduct an egg roll with - maybe next time).

Cocktail Hour

We haven't quite fallen in love with Soju yet.

However, as part of a mixer - it's not a bad deal!

Orange Juice and Soju, a good way to enjoy a meal at home!

Creamy Pasta

I don't measure, but I'll try my best to convey the ingredients and amounts used for this dish.

Ingredients/Directions:

Pasta for 2; boiled to al dente

Meanwhile chop, dice, and/or mince the following:
1/4 cup Mushrooms
3 Sm. Tomatoes
2 Green Onions
3 cloves Garlic

In a sauce pan:
Melt ~2Tbsp. Butter
Saute Mushroom, Garlic and Onion
Add Milk - 1/4c - 1/2c (rough approximation)
Add a handful or two of Mozzarella Cheese
Stir till melted and looking delicious
Decide if it's sufficient for the amount of pasta you're boiling.
Add aditional milk and cheese as you deem necessary.
Thicken it up with cornstarch or flour.

When pasta is al dente, mix it into the sauce.
Place in bowl, top with some tomatoes and Mozzerella

Enjoy with a glass of wine or a Korean Cocktail!

Curry Beef Lettuce Wraps

One of my FAVORITE aspects of eating at Korean restaurants is the frequency in which deliciously marinated and grilled meats are wrapped in a leaf of lettuce with the eater choosing what other food items to add to the the lettuce taco. (Now is when I would normally link to a previously posted recipe but in a moment of brillance, I decided to change the name of my blog, so while all my recipes are still here, I can no longer link to those which were the original Extended Shelf Life posts). Fortunately, my dal was essentially a recipe I got out of a Vegetarian Times magazine and can be found here.

In order to have a meal of these Curry Beef Lettuce Wraps, start the Indian dal first. Meanwhile, saute some onions and save for a potential lettuce wrap addition. I used the concept of these Garlic Curry Burgers to make (with the help of a dear friend) mini-curry burgers for our lettuce wraps. Soon as lentils, onions and burgers are ready, gather around the table and enjoy the lettuce wrap with a spoonful of lentils, a little burger and some onions - should be delicious!

Tofu Tacos

There are few doubts in my mind that there are better recipes for Tofu Tacos available. And, truthfully, I'm a Wyoming girl through and through, so tend to prefer my tacos with beef. However, Tofu was sitting in the fridge begging to be used and the craving at the moment was Tacos. Taco Seasoning would have made a sweet difference.

Tacos are not rocket science. Neither are Tofu Tacos.

Choose your taco veggies. Decide if you'd like to enjoy them raw or sauted. Take necessary action. I sauted mine, shoved them to the edge of the pan and made room for the Tofu. A little more oil, a bit of Cajun seasoning a little waiting a little stirring, Tofu was warm a little 'fried' and ready to be added to a tortilla with lettuce and cheese served alongside chips and salsa.

Disfrutala!

Korean Cooking: Class Five

Recently, our small, point and shoot died. So I only took one photo with my phone. Not very representative of the meal -- apologies.

This past Friday we went to the fifth and final cooking class. We prepared an outstanding dish of Pork Ribs (돼지 갈비 찜) and Egg Roll/Omelet (달걀말이). We were also given our first printed version of the recipe therefore this may turn out to be the most detailed Cooking Class post I've yet provided ^^

On the other hand, Mike and I split responsibility on these two dishes and I only mastered the Egg Dish (because I am a Master of Eggs).

Pork Dish Ingredients:

150 grams Rib Pork
1/2 sm. Carrot
1/2 sm. Potato
1/4 sm. Onion
1/2 Red Chili

(For Sauce)
2 Tbsp. Soy Sauce
1 tsp. Sugar
1 tsp. Cooking Wine
Pepper
Sesame Seeds
Sesame Oil
2 Tbsp. Onion, diced
1 clove Garlic, minced
Seasoning Salt

Directions:

Rinse of pork ribs in cold water, cut into bite size pieces then boil for a few minutes. Chop the carrot, potato and onion. Dice the red chili. Strain pork ribs use sauce pan to saute chili pepper before adding boiled pork ribs and half of the sauce plus one cup of water. Add carrot and potato, bring broth to boil then reduce heat and decrese liquid by about half. Add onion, the rest of the sauce and return to boil. Finally, add some sesame oil and return to boiling. Stir occassionally. Enjoy with rice.

Egg Dish Ingredients:

2 eggs
1/2 Carrot, diced
Sm. Green Onin, diced
Onion, diced
Sprinkle of Sugar
Salt to Taste
Cooking Wine/Liquor
Oil for frying

Directions:

Boil together 2 spoons of broth, sugar, salt and 2 spoons of liquor. Remove from heat. Mix two eggs with wisk or fork, add broth mixture. Add carrot and onions. Sufficiently oil a small pan to begin frying the egg. You will essentially attempt now to make an omelet but rather than folded, it needs to be rolled. Koreans manage this with a spoon and set of chopsticks ... here's the basic concept, pour a thin layer of egg into the hot pan, when egg is mostly set begin rolling from the edge toward the center. The side of the pan which is now exposed is ready for more oil (if necessary) and more egg mixture until all the egg has been cooked and rolled. (I'll try to video it sometime - because it's kind of a fun trick to learn). Cut into bite-size pieces and enjoy with a bowl of Makoli -- Korean Rice Wine (the white, creamy and more delicous one!). DELICOUS!!!

Slow-Cooker Apple Crisp

Extended Shelf Life for: Lemons (seriously, in the fridge for more than a month, maybe close to two)

As part of an all-out Fall-Apple celebration early in November, I finally tried out the one dish I've been planning since late September - a slow cooker Apple Crisp. The main idea for the recipe came from this Slow Cooker Apple Crisp Recipe on Allrecipes.com with a few substitutions as were necessary for my Korean life.

Ingredients/Directions:

6-8 cups thinly sliced Apples (I also threw in an Asian Pear because it was here)
2 Tbsp. Lemon Juice

Toss together apples and lemon juice.

To apples add --

1/3 cup Sugar
Healthy Shake of Cinnamon
A bit of Flour (unless you have cornstarch)

(When I was preparing this dish most recently, I had to cut my apples in the morning, refridgerate them, mix the dry ingredients together separately adding them after work right before turning the slowcooker on to begin cooking the meal. An easy step to take if the timing isn't quite on your side).

Separately Mix together --

1 cup Flour
1/2 cup Brown Sugar
1/2 cup White Sugar
Cinnamon
Salt
1/2 cup Butter

For a little crunch add Walnuts OR
                  Oat Clusters from any oaty breakfast cereal available at a grocer near you!

Into the crock pot base throw the apples with sugar and cinnamon, pour buttery-crunchy-sugary-flour mix on top, turn slow cooker to high for 2 hours or low for 4 hours. With 30 minutes left, check to see how it's cookin' mix things up if it seems fit, rest lid on slow-cooker so that top of crisp my begin to crisp without allowing excess heat to escape. Enjoy with a small paper cup of Apple Cider, more than 10 friends and small or large scoop of Walnut Ice Cream on top (or vanilla if you're back in the states) -- perfect way to encourage some fall joy into an otherwise ordinary night.

Apple Cider Taste-Alike

What says fall better than Apple Cider? Not much.

So, Wednesday night, we had some friends over for a night of Apples!

It began with a rather successful attempt at Apple Cider followed by an Apple Crisp to which I will soon post directions, and ended with a few good rounds of Apples to Apples. How about that for bringin' in a little Fall Tradition on the opposite side of the globe?

If you find yourself in Korea, craving Apple Cider this mix of beverages should satisfy the craving:

2 Parts Apple Juice
1 Part 수정과 (soo-jeon-ggwa)

For those living in the US, here are two Cider Options:

Chai Cider - which I was making last year about this time

Or, try your hand at making your own Soo-jeon-ggwa

Cajun Rice-Cake Stir-Fry

Extended Shelf Life for: Garlic, Mushrooms, Carrot (seriously, they'd all been in the fridge WAY to long, some garlic is even growing a little hair).

Dalk - Korea rice cake. One ingredient I anticipate will be difficult to come by upon returning home. However, while in Korea, there is no shortage, so I am happy to play around with these thick rice noodles.

A weekend or two ago I went to a church bizarre with some friends and purchased what I assume are home made rice-cake noodles. I wanted to practice making the dalk pokki we had made in our Korean Cooking class. However, there are more than enough of these rice cake noodles to keep on experimenting.

Ingredients:

3-5 Rice Cake Noodles, cut into 1 inch chunks

1/2 Carrot, sliced

1/2 cup Mushrooms, diced

1 cup Onion, sliced

2 cloves Garlic, minced

Seasoning Salt

Cajun Spice Mix

Korean Red Pepper Sauce

Oil for frying and preventing stickiness

Cheese, grated

1 Fried egg for each dish

Directions:

Saute first 5 ingredients together in enough oil to prevent sticking. When veggies and noodles are tender add seasonings. Throw the mix in a bowl, top with cheese and a fried egg -- because everything is better with a fried egg. Enjoy! (consider making the batch a bit bigger, you're likely to want more...well, we did).

Korean Cooking: Class Four

This will likely be my shortest post regarding the cooking class.  This was, I hate to admit, my least favorite dish we've made thus far. Another hangover soup and fried anchovies...

The fried anchovies were simple but not friendly toward my tastebuds.  Take some dry little anchovies, rinse them off (if you're lucky you'll see a little bitty squid!). Heat some olive oil in a frying pan add to the anchovies a sauce of: 2 Tbsp. Soy Sauce, 1 Tbsp. Spoon full of Sugar, 1 Tbsp. Corn Syrup, 1 Tbsp. Cooking Wine, minced Garlic and Black Pepper to taste. Saute for a few minutes, throw in a few chili peppers continue sauteing until peppers are crisp but tender. Enjoy the meal that stares back!

If you prefer not to see the eyes of what you're consuming, you can try out this bean sprout/hangover soup.

Ingredients:

Dried Pollock ~ 1/4 cup

Bean Sprouts ~ 1/4 cup

1 Clove Garlic, minced

Chili Pepper, to taste

1 Red Chili Pepper, bias cut

1 Green Onion, bias cut

Anchovy Stock or Chicken Stock ~ 3 cups

1 Egg - whisked

Directions:

Wash Pollock. Fry pollock in pan with a little sesame oil, soy sauce and black pepper to rid the fish of fishiness. In 3 cups of boiling stock add bean sprouts, cook 5 minutes to reduce smell ^^. Add onion, chilis, and garlic. Simmer 3-4 minutes reduce heat. Gradually pour in whisked egg but DON'T stir until egg has set, remove from heat and kiss your hangover goodbye!

Pasta Alfredo

Honestly, I can't claim any kind of culinary genius with this meal. But, personally, there's been something novel about learning how to create dishes quickly and simply.  For the first time in my cooking life, I'm choosing things that come together quick and easy.  For the first time in my life, I'm eating like a college student.  Occassionally it makes me a little sad. Other days, it's totally enthralling -- a whole new set of challenges that I'm a little anxious to tinker with.

After the simplicity of Ramen Stir-Fry I threw a little Italian into the mix. Boiled noodles, alfredo and your favorite mix of sauteed veggies -- or whatever happens to be in the refrigerator -- for us, it was onion, mushroom and garlic.

Quick. Simple. Delicious.