What's for Dinner Oppo?

[Exage03040]

I have a fusion I'm trying tonight:
It's an Indian Cottage Pie (or Sheppard's Pie with beef instead of lamb).

It's a seasoned yellow curry mashed potatoes over a pasanda (coconut and peanut) beef curry with peas, carrots and onion. Cooked as a Cottage Pie.

What are you eating!?

[CB]

I had a steak and cheese Subway sub.
It's not the most depressing thing I've eaten, but it's up there.

[Exage03040]

@cb Awe man! Tell me, was it at least fresh?

[Just Jeepin']

@cb I've fallen in love with their breakfast flatbread sandwiches. Yes, I know it could be fresher, but throw enough salt on there and heaven!

And at many locations they're available all day, so woo.

[jminer]

@just-jeepin I do love their breakfast too.

[6MT_FTW]

I was out and about today and got a little hungry so I grabbed a bite at Burger King. I'm cooking more and more these days and don't eat out very often, but their app has a double Whopper for $3 so I grabbed one; kind of hard to say no at that price.

If I get hungry later on I have some amazing fried rice that I whipped up last night. I learned to cook by watching my mother, and she's not one to use recipes but seems to have an instinctive knowledge of what works together and is a master of culinary improvisation. The meat is pre-cooked chicken thighs from Costco (they sell a huge tray for $4.99, probably leftover from the previous days $5 rotisserie chickens). The vegetables consist of Soycotash from Trader Joe's (edamame, corn and red bell peppers). The special ingredient in this batch was something that I picked up at a local International grocery store - lemon grass powder. I put in other spices as well, but like mom I grabbed things out of the cupboard that looked good and tossed them in; there's some garlic powder/pepper mix, Chinese five spice, some red pepper, a little sumac and who knows what else. It's fried up with a couple of eggs, and I used some chili Ponzu that I found in the cupboard. Top it off with a little furikake and I'm happy.

[Bandit]

@exage03040 A very boring veggie bake made of potatoes, zucchini, peppers, onions, and carrots. Fairly starchy, but still pretty healthy.

[Exage03040]

@6mt_ftw

Mmmmmmm, doing up some fried rice is great. I will do almost anything possible to do my own cooking. Even living out of a hotel room for 2 weeks with but a mere mini-fridge I'll sneak in a pressure cooker and make meals with it.

I learned from the TV, still do. Sad, but true. My immediate family is terrible at cooking. I started cooking dinner a few times a week for my family in high school, mostly because I didn't want to eat my moms food (bland, bland, bland and dry). They're acceptable at desert baking though.

[Exage03040]

@bandit

Doesn't sound bad to me. I would probably include something slightly acidic like tomato or a touch of lemon juice but if she goes down the hatch for you; job done.

[barnie]

Dang, that looks good. Your take with the cultural appropriation sounds delicious! Mom (RIP) was English and always made Shepard's Pie with beef, onions, peas and taters. Some spices and nothing else. Grew up on the stuff.

[6MT_FTW]

@exage03040 A funny anecdote about my mother's cooking. When she was a newlywed, age 21, she decided to make sweet and sour pork. This was over half a century ago, when SnS was purple in color, much like how pistachios used to be dyed red. Her mother wasn't the greatest cook, so mom was learning as she went. Not knowing about food coloring she used something that was close in color and was familiar to her because of her family's eastern European roots - beets, or in this case, the juice from a can of beets. Yeah, not exactly what you'd expect (or want) in Chinese food.

Of course, she's a much better and more knowledgeable cook these days, especially when it comes to Asian cuisine. My folks have been on culinary tours of Vietnam and Cambodia, and one of mom's cooking teachers (the one that led that trip) actually offered her a job at a Vietnamese restaurant that the instructor was opening. Mom turned it down because she likes to improvise in the kitchen and didn't like the idea of spending every day cooking someone else's recipes, and I can't blame her one bit.

There was an interesting incident with the microwave that sort of pertains to her skill at Asian cuisine. The MW, which was one of those built-in units over the stove, stopped working and my dad disassembled it to replace the broken part. The guy at the parts counter took one look at it and asked my dad if his wife was asian (she's actually Ukrainian/Polish). It seems that the part was covered in a film of oil, a side effect of stir frying, and is apparently a common problem in asian households. A compromise needed to be reached to avoid killing the MW again. Just like she has a separate small fridge in the kitchen for various stinky things, like homemade kimchi and various sauces and onions, the stir frying was to be done outside on the burner that's built in to their barbecue. It's plumbed into the gas line in the house, and they do live in SoCal so it's not like weather would prevent them from using it.

[Exage03040]

@barnie

I always enjoyed Cottage Pie as a kid too.

Thanks, it went extremely well. I believe a solid 8/10 and I'll be adding it to my roster of curry cooking. I needed 1 more potato as the mash got spread thin but it's a very solid first cook.

I don't know why but Sheppard's Pie popped in my head last night but lamb's getting expensive. Then I thought, well most of my curry cooking ingredients transfer over so could be worth investigating. Google had a handful of these with few reviews, so I took a quick breeze through and then made my own simple game plan.

[RallyDarkstrike]

@exage03040 That sounds delicious, I LOVE Shepherd's Pie!

We just had your run of the mill frozen pizza tonight for supper

[barnie]

@6mt_ftw Excellent story. Thank you! This is why I come to Oppo - for the little snippets of our lives. Nothing spectacular, just living and cars, of course. Such a varied group here and the bits and pieces we share are so interesting.

[CarsOfFortLangley]

We made borscht. SO GOOD

[Exage03040]

@rallydarkstrike

I've forced myself to stop at half the pan, I'm damn well going to enjoy it for day 2.
Nothing wrong with that. I'm weening myself off of Delissio and have started making my own pizza dough now. I might do #3 on Saturday.

[RallyDarkstrike]

@exage03040 said in What's for Dinner Oppo?:

@rallydarkstrike

I've forced myself to stop at half the pan, I'm damn well going to enjoy it for day 2.
Nothing wrong with that. I'm weeing myself off of Delissio and have started making my own pizza dough now. I might do #3 on Saturday.

Nice! I wish I had culinary skills....

[Exage03040]

@carsoffortlangley

YES! I had a genuine Ukrainian boss bring in some one day. It was fantastic!!!

[Exage03040]

@rallydarkstrike

I believe time is the single most limiting factor. The google can guide you to anything you want to make. However no one wants to come home after work to spend a bunch of time researching recipes, shopping, prepping, and cooking (particularly if multi-tasking). Failures happen, it takes perseverance with practice and tweaking. I treat it as one of my hobbies.

[jminer]

You’re all making me feel lazy right now. My wife is the chef and I have 5 or 6 dishes I make pretty good. I’m sequestered away from her right now and surviving on take out and sandwiches.

I did have bbq beef ribs tonight that were delicious though.

[6MT_FTW]

@carsoffortlangley Mmm, that sounds good. With sour cream, right? Of course - why did I even ask...

I have many fond memories of grandma's special Ukrainian meals; she didn't make them very often, mostly around the holidays, but it was always a treat. Even as I wee lad I enjoyed these spreads, somehow knowing that there was something a little extra to them. I am disgusted when I hear about children these days that will barely eat anything beyond hot dogs and chicken nuggets - they have no idea what they're missing.

Just the other day I read something about a mother taking uncooked hot dogs to a restaurant so that the chef could prepare them for her picky child. Say what? That just astounded me. Either have the kid eat the food at the restaurant or leave them at home. Or let them starve. It makes me wonder who is in control - the child or the parent.

[Exage03040]

@6mt_ftw said in What's for Dinner Oppo?:

Just the other day I read something about a mother taking uncooked hot dogs to a restaurant so that the chef could prepare them for her picky child. Say what? That just astounded me. Either have the kid eat the food at the restaurant or leave them at home. Or let them starve. It makes me wonder who is in control - the child or the parent.

Too bad it wasn't GR

[CarsOfFortLangley]

@6mt_ftw sour cream is mandatory!!

[frinesi2]

I had a cup of broth made from a bouillon cube. It was good broth!

Remember food? I miss food.

[ToniCipriani]

Thursdays and Fridays are usually leftovers days for me...