Asian Week

I declared it Asian week in the Starnes kitchen last week.  We stocked up on supplies at H Mart in Wheaton - rice paper, rice noodles, dried mushrooms, sushi rice, seaweed wraps, special sauces.  All good stuff.

This sesame cracker was something new for us.  They don't look like much in the package,

but stick it in the microwave for a minute and -

 POOF!  They puff up into a fluffy, crispy, tasty cracker!

We used them to taste our potsticker sauces.

Now, the potstickers themselves are another story.  A failure for sure.  I thought it was just because I used an odd mishmash of flours (a bit of GF all-purpose, a bit of GF mix from a big company, a big of "high protein" mix), but I think what actually happened was I was thinking Tablespoons instead of teaspoons when I added the xanthan gum. They tasted fine, but were tough and hard to work with.  I think xanthan gum was the culprit.  I'll be trying again, though, probably tomorrow, so there should be an update.  The chicken filling was really good though - chicken ground in the Mini-chopper, garlic, ginger, spicy pepper, a dash of fish sauce.

Other items made this week:

sushi filled with cucumber, avocado, wasabi crab, sriracha crab.

Sushi rice recipe from Alton Brown.  We actually left the rice on the counter overnight (it gets hard if refigerated) for making the same the next night (actually, husband had the rest of the crab, I had veg & chicken, more like a bibimbap).

The next night I made meatball summer rolls.  Sounds weird, but we had a version of this (with pork, I believe) at Vietnam restaurant in Philadelphia.  I took ground chicken and seasoned it the way I did for the potstickers earlier, then cooked it on the grill pan in small patties.  Rolled up with rice vermicelli, basil, cilantro, and pickled radish, carrot and cucumber, it was a great summer meal.

Somewhere in there we also made fish tacos.  Fresh corn tortillas filled with mojo-marinated grilled fish and queso fresco.  Awesome.

And last, but not least, this morning's breakfast: potato and pancetta hash (with onion) and topped with a runny egg.  This used up a package of pancetta ends we picked up at DiBruno Brothers on our trip to Philadelphia.  Probably wouldn't use them again though, they were pretty tough.

And the weekend turns round to a new week...

Hey! I did have a picture of that mac n cheese:

Friday: asparagus risotto

1 large shallot, diced.  Sauteed in about 1tbsp each olive oil and butter, plus 1/2 cups arborio rice, slowly cooked with 3 cups vegetable stock and 3 cups water.  A little mascarpone stirred in at the end, some frozen asparagus, and romano cheese.

Saturday: polenta lasagna

A little tomato sauce in the bottom, a layer of polenta slices (cut from tube of polenta), sauteed cremini mushrooms and onions, cannellini beans, mozzarella, polenta, tomato sauce, mozzarella.  Bake at 375 until bubbly and brown.

Sunday: family dinner with good friends.  Take-out Indian.  Much saltier than our neighborhood place, wow, were we both feeling it the next day.

Monday: risotto cakes, stuffed with mozzarella (flat arancini).

Phew!  Lots of good eating going on and no vegetarian-for-Lent deprivation!

Seared Scallops with Creamy Risotto

Seared scallops served over creamy risotto made with spinach, mascarpone, and parmesan.

Risotto:

saute some onion and garlic in butter and olive oil until soft. add rice and stir until rice is lightly toasted. add hot chicken stock 1/4 cup at a time, stirring slowly until stock is absorbed before adding more stock. when rice is tender, stir in scoop of mascarpone, a handful or two of fresh baby spinach until wilted, and give a squeeze of lemon at the end.

I don't mind making risotto, even with all the stirring and whatnot, but I can't figure out why it always takes me a lot longer and a lot more stock than most risotto recipes I've seen. This took nearly 7 cups of stock for 1 1/2 cups of rice and nearly an hour.

Husband even called it the best risotto he's ever had.

Sushi!

Smoked salmon with cucumber, smoked salmon with avocado, spicy crab with avocado, spicy crab with cucumber, cucumber and avocado, avocado with furikake rolls. Fun! They look less than perfect, of course, but it was delicious. We will definitely be doing this again!