Gold for us, or, Brainless Crowdpleasers

As promised, here is our family's list of BCPs. Note that it includes some take-out, eat-out, and frozen options. It's not limited to just what we can prepare from scratch; it's a list of what we can have for dinner that should mostly please everyone at the table. A lot of them are similar - permutations of each other - and that's okay. In fact, that's part of why this works.

I didn't do the exact math, but I think it's about 75% Asian, the reason for which I expounded upon in my previous post.

This is close to the order in which I originally brainstormed them, so you'll see funny associations and a lot of things grouped together because one thing made me think of another.

Nice to know I had Noona's approval on my list

It seemed weird to write all of them out, but I think that's the beauty of it. Having this list is gold for us, even if it doesn't look like much to anyone else.

1. Pork egg omelette
2. Costco rotisserie chicken and rice
3. Spring rolls (usually with rotisserie chicken)
4. Rotisserie chicken pho
5. Bún bowls w/ rotisserie chicken or steak (are you sensing a pattern here? ;P)
6. Thit kho / braised pork belly (Viet-Chinese blend)
7. Kalbi
8. Bulgogi that my MIL marinates, freezes, and brings over
9. Fried pompano from Evergreen Market
10. Cabbage Patch Soup
11. Pizza, homemade
12. Pizza, from Costco
13. Oxtail soup with noodles or rice, or turned into pho with the addition of fish sauce and rice noodles (we love any of these options with kale boiled in the broth at the last minute and removed)
14. Pho Asia take out or eat-in
15. Xuxu (chayote) soup
16. Canh with ground pork meatballs and opo squash or cabbage
17. Hamburgers
18. Homemade Hamburger Helper (I modify this with oregano instead of rosemary, and with minced garlic; also I use a lot more pasta water, and don't always use the full amount of chicken stock)
19. Pasta with bulk Italian sausage, spinach, artichoke hearts, sun-dried tomatoes
20. Sheet pan chicken
21. Fried rice
22. Green bean and egg with rice
23. Dumplings (frozen), noodles, and vegetable in chicken broth
24. Cauliflower alfredo fettucine
25. Vietnamese chicken curry
26. Golden curry with chicken thighs
27. Sunday Night Stew
28. Pot roast
29. Corned beef and cabbage
30. Chile verde for tacos or rice bowls
31. BBQ beef brisket
32. Whole chicken soup with ginger and garlic
33. Chicken or pork meatball porridge with Chinese fried donut, cilantro/ginger/green onion
34. Ginger fried rice
35. Take-out sullungtang or soondubu
36. Ground pork sauce over thin spaghetti or Shandong noodles (I posted on something similar once, and have since learned a better marinade for the meat, so I might update that)
37. Ham and green beans
38. Ginger chicken - plain or with celery, bell pepper, or whatever other vegetable needs to be used up (a cross between Viet ga kho gung and Chinese ginger chicken)
39. Steamed spare ribs in black bean sauce
40. Yakisoba or japchae
41. Israeli couscous with chicken, zucchini, and tomato (I made this once with orzo and it was a hit, although also a confusing mind trip because orzo is rice-shaped.)
42. Spaghetti with the marinara on the side
43. Beef, vegetable, macaroni soup (like minestrone)

Pork egg omelette  (#1 on this list and for good reason) is my shorthand for what some may call coin-purse egg omelettes. This post on Woks of Life has good pictures of what they look like when you make them the "real" way - they really look like coin purses of egg filled with ground pork inside, and you can make them smaller to make them kid-sized. 

My mom made them this way growing up, but I do a simplified version that works for us, and is faster. It doesn't look nearly as pretty, hence the lack of pictures here, but it tastes the same to me.

You basically marinate ground pork in what my mom would call "the standard marinade" (the ingredients of which would remain a mystery to me until I got into my 30s - maybe she was waiting for me to reach Mom Status before she revealed to me these secrets??), saute the meat, then, pour beaten eggs over it.

I use my spatula to cut the "omelette" into fourths, and then carefully flip over each quarter and let them cook until set. You can add green onions if you're feeling fancy, and then serve over rice. 

This is a basic weeknight meal that usually goes over well with kids because it's not meat that requires intensive chewing. ;)

Pork Egg Omelette

Marinate 16-20 oz ground pork in salt (~1/2 t), a couple rounds of soy sauce, a swirl of sesame oil, 1-2 t corn starch, ~1/4 cup water, and couple of good shakes of ground white pepper. I usually mix this up with a fork.

Heat up a skillet over medium high heat. Add a swirl of oil, and brown all the meat. While the meat is browning, crack 3-4 eggs into a bowl, add a splash of water and beat with a fork. (Ultimately I will do this twice, so maybe you might just want to start with 6-8? For some reason, I do each batch separately.) I bet that a dash of shiaoxing wine in the egg mixture would be awesome.

When the meat is browned, remove half of it to a plate. Spread out the other half in the pan. Pour the beaten egg mixture (or half of it, if you've beat the full amount) over the ground pork and let cook until you think it's ready to cut into four pieces and flip them over. 

Repeat the process with the other half of the meat. Serve with green onions (which could have also gone into the egg), rice, and extra soy sauce for those who wish.

Emi's drawing of multi-colored fried eggs, with crocheted "chicky" on the side

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I'll gradually work on adding more recipes for these BCPS, but feel free to comment if you'd like me to bump up a certain recipe in the queue. 

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Also, this list seems heavily fall/winter influenced. I wonder if I'll add/update when spring and summer come around.

...which, at this rate, doesn't seem like will ever arrive.

But until then, we'll keep enjoying Kayla's snow cream (milk, sugar, and vanilla poured over snow).

A few randoms, IV

#shelfie

1. Theo and Emi have been obsessed with chickens and eggs lately. (We also got three new Barred Rock chicks last Friday!) A couple weeks ago, Theo created an imaginary friend/chickie that he has named Eggy, and it's made of one of my knit hats stuffed with socks wrapped inside a towel. The two have since gathered more knit hats and made more "chickies" with these. Last night Emi asked me to crochet her a tiny hat for one. It's about the size of a cotton ball and perfect for her newest chickie. They love making nests and coops for their chickies.

2. Mari Andrew was on Forever35 talking about how even in her dream job (of being artist, I assume she means), she realizes how important it is to start the day with gratitude as a self-care practice. I enjoyed listening to this segment beginning around 41 minutes (Episode 38).

3. My friends Kayla and Marla and I have been talking and thinking about the concept of intuitive eating as brought up in The Lazy Genius and Healthy Eating episode which was very intriguing and provocative. If you give it a listen, let me know what you think!

4. If you need some laughs, check out this funny list of mom memes that my brother, of all people, sent me.

5. I have been desperately wanting more houseplants and found some new fun ones I'm super excited about. I even made a simple macrame plant hanger for one of them (not shown, because lighting is bad in basement, which is precisely why plants are needed to cheer up the space).

5b. Speaking of the basement, we've recently shifted the indoor trampoline that was in the basement out to the carport (which wasn't being well utilized) so that the basement could be more of a playroom/office/studio. Changes! Good changes, for once. ;p Transforming the carport into a covered, outdoor play space has been awesome for winter. I self-five myself for my great ideas.

6. This isn't anything that new to our life/routine but I want to capture it here on my blog because I'm sure I'll forget in the years to come. A lot of our evenings these days look like me and David alternating nights going gai gai (outing in Cantonese) with Kathy, while the littles sleep. TJMaxx, Target, Michaels, and Winco are some of regular destinations.

7. My meal planning game has really been upped since I took a course with The Lazy Genius. I plan on sharing more about that in this space soon. Stay tuned!

8. Another thing I am likely to forget about in the future is how long this current phase with Cori has felt. She's a little over four months now and up until this last week has not fallen asleep for bed before 10 or 11pm. For many weeks it was midnight or 1am. David and I got used to staying up late doing things but it was exhausting (probably especially for David who usually gets up at 5am). Now she's finally creeping up on an earlier bedtime and it's wonderful. Also, her naps are so irregular compared to T + E (although as my friend Kelli pointed out, Theo and Emilyn were probably both "my worst sleeper" when they were in that stage, too, lol). I've tried so many different waketime lengths and frequently end up with 45 minute naps. So these last couple of days I'm also keeping her up longer (much longer than I did with T + E) and seeing some moderate success. But we shall see.

It's rilly hard to be mad at this face, tho.

We are obsessed with her dough-soft cheeks. Kathy came up with the nickname Cori bao (or cork-u-bao, a blend of porcupine and cha siew bao). We also call her Corky.

9. I'm crocheting another blanket and am excited for how it will turn out. It's nice to have a project where I can see progress and growth!

10. Theo and Emilyn are saying the funniest things and I need to do a round-up of all those quotes here soon. For now, here's something that just happened yesterday:
Theo (eating gyoza): Mama, what are these dumplings called? (Because we usually eat boiled dumplings and not pan-fried.)
Me: Well, you could call them gyoza or potstickers.
Theo: Oh, okay. I really like these potstickers!

11. I started my own One Line A Day journal using a beautiful Moleskine journal my friend Kayla had gotten me years ago that was too pretty to write in. The mint green is just so on point. We will see how long this lasts. So far I have written a sentence for Jan 8-15 :D

Yes week

My journey of coming into my own as a parent in the Northwest has felt not unlike what I imagine it would be like to train for a marathon in higher altitudes. There are so many days when I think, it'd be so much easier for me to do this in the Bay Area - easier weather on me and the kids, and the support of family.

But then there are days I look up (or maybe slow down) and realize that all my effort and striving is actually providing sweeter fruit. And I am stronger for having worked harder at this thing called life.

I so resonated with my friend Christine's recent post, where she talked about slowing down being the perfect (if not unexpected) antidote to the stress of busyness.

Parenting a two- and four-year old feels relentless most days (especially when observed from the span of a week, or a month, or a year), so when I find those moments when I manage to sink deeper into the mess of whatever is that moment, or better yet, when I can contribute to that mess in my own way, I actually find that the time passes more quickly. Or is it rather that the passage of time ceases to matter so much? We're just here, fully in this moment.

We fell/flowed into a pretty creative groove this week. It may have started when my friend Kayla texted me this how-to draw your own mandala blog post.

When the kids were out with David on a quick errand, I brewed myself a cup of ginger turmeric tea, borrowed a compass from Kathy, and got started on the template.

Half an hour into it, the kids ran in and wanted to join me. We keep art supplies somewhat reachable for them whenever they want, so they both climbed up and started their own projects. I didn't say anything about what I was doing, so it was fascinating to see Emilyn draw her circles. Theo noticed the compass and wanted me to show him how to use it. His first drawing here is within those penciled circles, and his next one is completely his own creation.

Another day I had had some weird time block to fill, so I cut up a cereal box into a puzzle - the front panel into 12 pieces for Theo, and the back into 6 pieces for Emilyn. They were occupied for a solid 25 minutes.

And then just today I made some playdough. They have been loving it at other people's houses (you know, where the nice moms live). I'm not a huge fan (who is?) but today I felt like making it. I had some old whole wheat flour that was going a little stale (lol) so I guess I made hippie playdough.

It made me happy dance inside to see Theo with it. First of all, he helped me with mixing and kneading it, and then when I came back upstairs from waking Emilyn up, I saw that he had split the dough into two piles, placing one of them in front of a chair for his sister.

First, Theo made a snowman. (If you look closely above, you can see a snowman with a tiny head and no midsection.)

Next, he opened up a soup/noodles/dumpling shop and asked me what I wanted from the "calendar" (menu). He then asked if I wanted it "hand shaved" (as opposed to hand cut, the other option available at King Noodle).

Finally, he started rolling balls of cookie dough, so that his customers could "enjoy it." I was most impressed by the uniformity of his balls. I think he's learned from watching Kathy bake.

***

When I talked to my counselor today I was trying to figure out why exactly this spontaneous week of creativity was so life-giving for me as their mom. I figured out that it's because I got to create as well, not just set them up for creating. I got to draw, and so I cared less about what they did (and yet they blew me out of the water with their drawings). I got to make playdough and so it didn't matter how much they enjoyed the playdough. I cut up the puzzle using stuff we already had and which was going to the recycling bin anyway.

It's a little like what Dave Ramsey refers to as happy-happy situations - happy if it works out and happy if it doesn't. I didn't spend a million dollars or buy products with tons of packaging.

I recently listened to a podcast where they talked about a "yes hour" - when you actually say yes to your kids instead of the usual no along with the litany of excuses why not. It can be such a good reset. And while I did not tell any people under the age of 5 that we are having a "yes week" I think I have succeeded in shaking things up.

***

Closing randoms:

Kendra of The Lazy Genius has been killing it lately with her podcasts. Her recent two series on routine and summer have inspired and guided me.

Also really blessed by Emily P. Freeman's podcast The Next Right Thing. (Maybe listen from the beginning?? Recent memorable episodes are number 25 and 34.)

Made these raspberry yogurt popsicles last week. It's the second time I've made them and I was still weirded out by the Pepto-Bismol look of them when you're blending it up. But it freezes beautifully. If you have a Vitamix I recommend not trying to blitz the seeds to pieces or else they won't go through the strainer as well and you'll end up with even more seediness. Third time's the charm, I guess. (Also, Molly says she reduces the sugar from 3/4 cup down to 1/2 cup now. Go with your gut, I've done both.)

(Last year's post on popsicles. And have I not yet posted about golden milk popsicles??)

Mango sticky rice is always a good idea.

Butter Chicken, or A Good Way to Start the New Year

We got an Instant Pot around Cyber Monday and have been loving it. 

(It helps to go in with super low expectations, like it's just* an electric pressure cooker. It will not make dinner for you or, sadly, wash the dishes afterwards.)

(*Alex: "It's just chicken and rice.")

David christened our IP with this Butter Chicken recipe. Then, for Friendsgivingmas, I tweaked the recipe and made it vegetarian. It was a huge hit and a couple of friends have since asked for the recipe so I'm posting it here with all my modifications. 

Instant Pot Butter Chicken (or Butter Vegetables)
adapted from Jo Cooks

6 tbsp butter
12-16 cloves garlic minced (1 to 1.5 heads) (see Note below)
5 T ginger minced (again, see Note)

4 tbsp tomato paste

1 28-oz can whole tomatoes, blended (yes, in your blender #sorrynotsorry) with liquid

2 t salt

2 T garam masala
2 T ground coriander 

2 T paprika, smoked if you have it.

2 t ground cumin 

2 t turmeric
3 lbs boneless and skinless chicken thighs, cut into 1.5 inch pieces OR equivalent amount vegetables (my favorite is a head of cauliflower, ~3 yukon gold potatoes, and a 10-oz package of frozen peas and carrots)
2 cups heavy cream (oh yeah, baby)
1 bunch cilantro, roughly minced

Note: Because of the large amount of garlic and ginger, I recommend using a food processor to grind together the ginger and garlic. First, peel the ginger and chop into smaller pieces, then add to processor. Slightly smash garlic cloves to remove peels, then add cloves to food processor. Process until you have a paste, scraping down the sides as necessary.

Turn on Instant Pot to saute setting. Add butter to pot. When melted, add ginger-garlic puree and saute for a few minutes until fragrant. 

Add tomato paste and saute together with ginger-garlic to impart a deeper flavor into the sauce. Then add blended tomatoes, salt, and spices. 

At this point, if you are making the chicken version, add chicken pieces, close and seal the pot and cook for 5 minutes on Poultry seasoning. Do 10 minutes of natural release, and then complete with a Quick Release. Stir in heavy cream and use the Saute mode to keep the sauce simmering. Stir in chopped cilantro before serving.

If you are making the vegetarian version, add cubed potatoes (large-ish chunks?) and cook on a pressure setting (like Meat/Stew? I'm still learning the IP, but I believe all the auto settings besides rice use the same high pressure setting) for 5 minutes. Do 10 minutes of natural release, then complete with a Quick Release. Switch to saute mode and add cauliflower cut into florets, and bag of frozen peas and carrots. Cook until tender. Then stir in heavy cream and chopped cilantro.

Serve over rice and/or naan. 

P.S. Don't forget my friend Kayla's tip to save leftover tomato paste. Scoop it into tablespoons onto a small sheet of parchment paper and freeze. When it's frozen (or at least par-frozen), add them to a little baggie and throw it in your freezer. Label the bag - you think you will remember what it was but you won't. The dollops come in so handy when you just need a tablespoon or two. 

Theo(logic)

We have been busy trying to soak up what I experienced as a short-lived summer.

(Yes, Kayla and Linnea, I suppose that exposes my non-nativeness to feel this way about the summer we had!)

At least, that is my excuse for why I haven't blogged in a while about anything, and it's certainly been ages since I've shared what Theo and Emilyn are saying lately.

As usual, I've tried to jot down things in my Notes app, so here is a collection since the last time I wrote about him in February. It's in chronological order so you can keep in mind the context of growing from 3yr1mo to 3yr9mo and through the seasons of winter, spring, summer and now fall. He started preschool last week!

Lol, I suppose I could have cropped this, and then captioned, "Is Theo wearing pants?"

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After I muttered to myself, "When will it stop raining?" Theo said, "It will stop raining when you go to your nap, in your dreams."

To David, regarding some privilege: "Will you talk it over with Umma?"

"Don't cry Emi, we're almost home."

"Don't laugh; it's not a laughing game."

"Breathe in and out" to himself.

Earlier this year, he asked if he could use sidewalk chalk. Since it was raining a lot, I said, "when it's Spring, we can bring out the sidewalk chalk." One day probably in March, he noticed the pink camilias blooming on the side of the house, and so he said to me, "The camilias are blooming; can we have sidewalk chalk?"

To me, "You don't need shoes on; just your feet." He knows I'm a Berkeley girl.

"I took a picture with my eyes."

When he wasn't ready for me to kiss him goodnight, he told me "Go control your computer" because he knows I usual check my email between putting Emilyn to bed and then saying goodnight to him.

"Nuna is quite the baker."

One day when David was mowing the lawn, David asked him what he wanted to do, since he dislikes the loud noise of the mower. Theo asked, "Can I stay inside and dance?" Kathy, Emilyn, and I were out at that time, so when we came home, we just saw Theo dancing by himself in the living room, and we found out the rest of the story from David.

"Can I come to your house?" He started saying this a couple of months ago, to grandparents whenever we FaceTimed them. Of course they loved this.

Back in April when it was David's birthday, I asked Theo what we should get for his birthday. Without any hesitance, he offered, "Moss killer."

And first thing in the morning on that birthday, he said, "Can we have cake today because it's your birthday?"

Again, earlier in the summer, to one of my friends: "I'm ready for preschool. I go to preschool three times a week for an hour. I start in the fall." (Actually he goes twice a week for two hours.)

Referring to packaged seaweed, "No, don't throw away the silica gel, or else it won't be crispy!"

He started buckling himself into the carseat in April, at 3 years and 3 months. So nice that he can climb in and get buckled himself.

Sometimes before bed, David has all of Theo's monkeys warm up their singing voices for bedtime songs. When they say "mi mi mi mi mi", Theo sometimes says "me me me me mini mini me."

I love watching Emilyn copy Theo's dance moves.

Because Kathy calls Theo her "Chicken Heart" or "Chicken Thigh" etc., Theo started saying "chop chop chop" while he pretends to chop his arm into bite-sized pieces for her to eat.

"Appa, statch me." By which he meant, can you pray that prayer where you ask God to let me grow in wisdom and stature, in favor with God and man?

"I'm going to preach school."

Without prompting, he began a letter to Emilyn, which read, "I love you, I like to climb, I love playing with you."

There's a Vietnamese sticky rice coconut dessert which Theo calls squishy dessert, but the way he says it, it sounds like "kwishy dirt."

"I'm not a baby, I'm a Theo. Don't talk about babies; let's talk about big boys."

One day, I said, "I'm looking for the one who loves Jack Jack (Emilyn)" when I was trying to get Kathy's attention. Theo intervened saying "I love Jack Jack!"

One day he said "The storms of Jesus Christ" maybe because we told him that God controls nature?

"Don't cry Emilyn, I'm here, I'm not going anywhere."

"I want to trick Umma."

"Wake up so I can bother you!"

On a drive, "If I see a tractor, I will tell you."

"We can go on a date? What the??? Tractor??!!"

When I mentioned I needed to go to the pharmacy, he asked if there would be any tractors. At the Farm-acy, duh.

"I don't want cat cookies, there's sugar bugs."

"I'm organizing over there." He has started to "organize" things. Am I really happy about this? YAS.

"I'm sitting on this rice sock so that I don't cough or bless you."

"We have an appleseed tree and two maple trees."

He often mashes together two thoughts into one sentence: "I don't know how to do this?"

"I'm thirsty for salt. Savory."

When I started loosely and slowly weaning Emilyn I had to tell her once, "I'm not going to nurse you right now." Theo overheard and he asked, "Is it because you're growing, and you're a big umma?"

Theo wanted more Milo (an Asian chocolate malted drink), so I told him I would pick up more of it when I went to Evergreen. A week after I had told him that, I mentioned to David that I needed to go to Evergreen. Immediately, Theo said in a robotic voice, "Can-you-pick-up-my-Milo."

One time when David was merging on to the freeway and a car sped up at the last minute to overtake him, Theo yelled out, "Share the road!" (We honestly have never said that out loud so it was really funny.)

David likes to use the speaker/amplifier in the mini-van to imitate airplane pilot monologues (e.g., ":::ssssshhhhhhhhhh::: This is your captain speaking...") so Theo has started doing it as well, only he says, "This is your speaking captain..."

"If I can watch a show with front loaders and a backhoe, then I'll get my hair cut!" Talk about sentence construction.

"Mama, did you make grits for me? I'm hungry for grits."

"My tummy loves warm."

"Look at what happened to my waffle." (It's gone.)

One day when Emilyn was crying in the back of the van, Theo told me, "She wants everything. She wants a nap, she wants to go to the park, she wants her friends." I love how he asked himself a question in his head and then answered it for all of us.

"I know her full name. Ro Ro Ro Ro Emilyn Ro."

He took care of Emilyn's stuffed bunny and treated it like a baby.

When we got in the car one day, he asked for the "joy joy podcast", by which he meant the song "Down In My Heart."

In the middle of summer, "Don't wake me up to preschool!"

When I mentioned that I might pull him out of school to go to Richmond for a few weeks in late winter, he said, "I need my daddy and my nunu. That will be too much. Or I will go with just Emilyn." When I asked, "Then what will Mama do?", he said, "Mama will get a date."

One day Theo was arranging logs on the deck and he called it Silver Lake. I did not comprehend what he was saying until later that week we went to Silver Lake and the parking lake had logs arranged to mark off the parking spaces.

He uses the word "cantilever" and pronounces it "cant-a-leave-er." It's too much.

One morning when David was home during breakfast (it means either the weekend or a weekday he's working late), Theo could tell Emilyn was starting to feel anxious that I'd be leaving to take a walk. All of this was unspoken, until Theo asked me, "You can just walk laps around the kitchen, right?" He knew that she didn't want me to leave.

As soon as Theo gets home from school, he pulls his pants off and yells, "Free!"

And then just yesterday, when I pulled out grapes for dessert during dinner, he said "I want g-r-..." and proceeded to spell a couple of other (wrong) letters. "I want icecream for dessert. G-r-..." because we always spell out the good things.

We met one of Kathy's new floormates this year and her name is Erica. Theo later commented that her name is like "the America flag." Indeed, "Erica" is in America.

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Alright, now I'm up to speed with Theo. Up next, Emilyn!

P.S. For my own record (since I'm no longer logging everything obsessively in an Excel file, ha! Although, Elizabeth, aren't you glad that I had? ;p), it appears that Theo is dropping his nap. I can't be totally sure, and I think he may still need it on school days, but I'm 90% sure this is happening right now. :'(

P.P.S. Marla, I am totally channeling the "and because it's due, this is what I will write."

Pho-sho!

Life is full and life is good right now.

The sun is finally here and while we're still making tons of popsicles (these and these currently encompass our repertoire), we are true Asians who can enjoy hot soup even during the summer.

I already loved Andrea Nyugen for her Into the Vietnamese Kitchen, so I was delighted to discover that she had written a book dedicated entirely to pho.

In Pho, she offers three levels of complexity for entering the world of cooking your own pho: quick weeknight pho, pressure cooker pho, and the real deal pho. I appreciate the backdrop of authenticity with shortcuts to make a daunting meal slightly more accessible.

Kayla had no idea I had just checked the book out from the library when she surprised me with this notebook at church on Sunday!

Classic pho with beef is an all-day (if not more) affair, so it's rare that I will endeavor to make it, though I'm always so pleased with myself when I do. When the older kids started living with us, I figured out a cheater rotisserie chicken pho, where I boiled the leftover carcass, added fish sauce, and served it with simple garnishes. I wasn't sure it was a thing (faux pho?) but when I saw Nguyen's inclusion of it in her cookbook I felt vindicated.

Chicken has such a light flavor compared to beef, so it can handle a lighter broth without all the spices that normally accompany the standard beef broth.

I've mentioned before how we love to do noodle bowl (bun) and spring rolls with rotisserie chicken, and this is what we usually do with the carcass and any meat if there is some leftover! You can't beat a cooked chicken for $4.99 (at Costco) that can be stretched into two meals.

I'm including my oversimplified recipe here, even though Nguyen's version is simple enough. I don't even bother to char ginger and onion for the base.

Super basic rotisserie chicken pho

Depending on what we have done with the chicken, we don't always have enough meat for the soup, so I supplement with other proteins like tofu or egg, and I love serving this with broccoli as well, which I blanch in the broth.

1 rotisserie chicken carcass
any leftover meat you have
broccoli or other vegetables (optional)
fish sauce
cilantro, green onions, sliced yellow onion (soak in cold water for 10 minutes)
Thai basil, and limes for garnish
black pepper
sriracha

Boil the carcass in a pot of water (use some or all stock if you have some), at least 1 hour but for as many hours as you have time for. I often add 1/2-1 t of salt, but not too much, as you will season with fish sauce later.

Soak 1 16oz package of banh pho noodles in a pot of (cool) water. I use the same pan that I will later boil them in. (In case you didn't know - which I didn't when I first started making Viet food in 2011 - you want to boil rice noodles in separate water from your broth because of all the starch. Also, the pre-soak is not necessary, but I do find that if I can remember to soak them, it creates a more chewy texture, emulating the fresh version.)

Prep all your garnishes. Before serving, boil the noodles until tender (it takes less time if you've done the pre-soak), and divide the noodles into the diners' bowls. Add chicken, cooked broccoli (if using), cilantro, green onions, yellow onion, and a few grinds of black pepper to all the bowls.

Taste the broth, adding 1-2 T fish sauce to season. Bring it to a good boil and ladle into bowls. Serve with Thai basil and limes, and any of your other favorite garnishes. (I'm not a huge bean sprout person, so...)

Enjoy! :)

A bit of both

Hi!

When I start to slip off the blogging bandwagon sometimes it's hard to tell if it's because I'm feeling bummed about life or if it's because I've been busy trying to make a great life.

Lately it's been a bit of both.

This (and having my sister-in-law close by) saved me last week during the Week From Hell. (Alex, Wednesday night was the highlight of my week (maybe year haha!), but somehow it made Thursday and Friday just that much more unbearable!)

I could use a Vacation from my Problems!

But my Real Life is also pretty sweet.

And here are some random paradoxes/tensions I've been thinking about lately:

accuracy vs. precision
self-hood vs. community
submission vs. autonomy
being like everyone vs. being unique
feeling content vs. striving for improvement
grief vs. gratitude/pleasure
being conservative vs. having an abundance mentality
feeling hopeful vs. being realistic

Finally, interesting article and cute item.

And also, I need this. But not at that price. It's not OK.

Thin slices of joy

If you may recall from my can-it-just-be-spring-already? goals list, one of the things I committed to do was to keep track of moments of joy in every day. My friend Stephanie commented on that post and left a link to an article about a Google engineer who has taught people to use the tools of mindfulness to find "thin slices of joy" in their days. I thought that was helpful language, and even the image of that (i.e., those "thin slices") gives me joy.

After publishing that post, I had the idea to use the monthly view on my (paper) calendar to keep track of the moment (or moments) of joy in each square. There was something satisfying about using a calendar as a to-done list more than a to-do, and incidentally it makes it easy to report here on my blog what my thin slices of joy were for the remainder of April since writing that post.

19 | the sweetest puppies ever befriended me, Theo, and Emilyn at the park
20 | good and open conversation; going antiquing downtown (we had randomly decided to go that day, and discovered when we got there that they were suppose to close by the time we arrived, but there happened to be a special event that day that meant they were open later than usual!)

The universe sent me a message at the antique store.

21 | a crazy sunny day which led to a picnic and basketball game with extended family
22 | a neighbor walking across the street to introduce herself when I was out on a walk because she's seen me walking for years

Also from April 22: the color of Thai banana contrasted against chia seed pudding. (Should I just title this post thin slices of yellow/sunshine/happiness?)

23 | working on a blog post that made me excited; cooking ginger chicken and a new Viet soup that I knew Kathy would really enjoy
24 | sunshine (again!); getting to bring dinner over to a neighbor's and eat together
25 | the coconut popsicles from my postscript were really delicious
26 | thrifting and finding awesome books I actually wanted; great dinner/conversation with a friend; listening to a very good podcast
27 | sunshine (yet again!)
28 | playing outside with the kids with my new Bluetooth speakers (why didn't I get these earlier?!) projecting Renee & Jeremy (but alas, also the day I felt dumb trying to figure out Stories on Instagram, thank you slai for trying to make me feel better); providing a recipe and all the ingredients for my sis-in-law to make dinner at her home, which her family ended up loving*

(*If you haven't made sheet pan chicken yet, you are really missing out. Seriously, unless you're a vegetarian or you're allergic to delicious food, you should not be living one more day without this in your life. Sorry to be so bossy. I really need to stop over-selling it and risk you being disappointed. Like, maybe I should change the title of the post to "It's just rice and chicken, nbd.")

29 | conversation with a friend
30 | surprising a friend with a chai at church without even knowing she had forgotten to make her tea that morning (!); going to the Indian buffet by myself (Butter Chicken for President!)

The weird (but perhaps not really that weird) thing is that after I decided to do this whole thin slices of joy thing, my days actually did get better. Even the weather got (incrementally) better. Yes, three sunny days out of 12 is not that great, but I noticed - and savored - those brighter days.

The real trick will be whether this will work in the dead of winter... so friends, if I feel crummy in the winter of 2017/2018, please ask me if I'm doing this still, and remind me to go visit my in-laws to get a break. (I can just go back to the mountain top, right, Marla?)

Anyway, I'm definitely keeping up in May and I invite you to join along!

And now here's this week's menu:

Chicken curry. Do it. 

YOU GUYS. Posting this menu was my TENTH TIME doing a weekly menu plan and sharing it. Can I just pat myself on the back here? I am so darn proud of myself.

P.S. Let it be known that when I left my computer and came back, David had changed my notes to: thin slices of joy pork belly

P.P.S. My friend Kayla texted me this article about self-care vs. "resourcing" and of course I loved it because the author talks about the function and efficacy of word choice, and while neither Kayla nor I personally resonated with her specific choice of "resourcing," I did enjoy the resourcefulness of her choosing a word that helped her focus on self-care more easily. (This is all in reference to my preferring to think about what I'm "thankful" for vs. what I'm "grateful" for.)

A few randoms

1. New guilty pleasure: Nashville. Connie Britton, singing, love triangles... um, swoon, basically. "No One Will Ever Love you" = so haunting I died.

2. Let's talk about meal planning for like the 50th time. I decided that not feeling ecstatic about having a set meal plan > stressing out about what we are having for dinner every day. I'm trying to think of it like Anne Lammott's shitty first drafts: my inner critic should not be criticizing until there is something to critique.

We are challenging dairy this week on the elimination diet, if you were wondering.

And if you didn't catch the post on sheet pan chicken, do it meow.

3. "Focus on being a verb, not a noun." This was referenced on the The Mom Hour podcast on radical self-care, and attributed to a poet who was on Liz Gilbert's Big Magic podcast. The poet was trying to tell an aspiring artist, "don't try to be a poet, just write poems." I really like that, and I think that is a good thing to tell myself. I don't need to try to be a blogger, I'm just going to focus on writing blog posts. Such an easy and freeing shift of perspective! 

4. Another good quote. "One does not discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time." --Andre Gide

5. Related to #1, because I cannot get enough of Connie Britton, I am getting back into Friday Night Lights while working on a crochet project. So fun.

6. Green chocolate smoothies with mixed baby greens, rice + coconut milk, frozen banana, cocoa powder, medjool dates, and chia seeds.

Pro tip courtesy of my friend Karen: when you can't finish that box of baby greens from Costco (you know the one), freeze it so it's ready for smoothies.

7. I am not a nail polisher by any stretch of the imagination, but Kathy surprised me with this amazing bottle that looked good even when applied by someone with the nail-polishing skills of a 12-year-old boy (that's me). It gave me that my-nails-but-better look; I had no idea that what would look like a perfect neutral on me would appear so pink in the bottle. Consider me enlightened.

8. This red lentil soup. If Molly Wizenberg and Melissa Clark tell you to make something, you listen up. Follow every step, including blending half of the soup. (Though I have to admit, I held off on the salt until later because of my extreme fear of the lentils not softening. Kayla, you know what I'm talking about!)

monster trucks provided by Theo

Tell me what's up with you! Any inspiring quotes, good podcasts, satisfying meals, fun shows, tips/tricks, stupid stuff that makes you laugh?

Cilantro turmeric salmon patties

I mentioned that we would be doing an elimination diet (no gluten, dairy, eggs, soy, nuts, shellfish, or corn) to see if it could help my (and Emilyn's) eczema. We officially started on January 10, after the kids' birthdays and grandparents' visits, so today marks the first day of Phase 2, where we challenge the allergens, one at a time, to determine which we may have intolerances to.

True story: when David told Theo we'd be eating toast for breakfast, he quickly retorted, "No, Emilyn can't have gluten! Just like she can't have marbles!"

The diet has been hard because, as you know, I do like my food. And these allergens are in a lot of things. Basically we've been eating meat (and I'm not a huge meat eater so that was different), vegetables, and rice. The saving grace of this diet is that we've not been asked to give up rice. Also, we've treated ourselves to a never-ending supply of avocados (which are great for turkey avocado roll ups).

Though weight loss wasn't one of the goals for me personally, I did lose almost six pounds because it was just too much effort to snack. (It also didn't help/hurt that we got sick with the stomach flu on Day 3.)

I think my skin is better, but I never achieved complete relief. We'll see what happens over the course of the new few weeks of the challenge phase.

In the meantime, I wanted to share one recipe that we really loved. It's inspired by my friend Kayla's salmon patties which she serves over salad with her incredible Greek dressing.

David jumped on making these one night for dinner and they turned out so well. He tweaked it with turmeric and it is amazing. Turmeric goes so well with fish.



Cilantro-turmeric salmon patties
Inspired by Kayla Dunbar and Nourishing Meals

gluten-, dairy-, and egg-free!

1 cup cooked quinoa
1 clove garlic, minced
1 large handful fresh cilantro, chopped
1 thin slice of lemon, including rind (remove any seeds)
1/2 medium yellow onion, minced
2 (6 oz) cans of wild salmon, drained
1 t ground turmeric
1 t salt
freshly ground black pepper

In a food processor, blend together quinoa, garlic, cilantro, and lemon slice. Add in onion, salmon, turmeric, salt and pepper and blend until combined.

Heat up a skillet on medium to medium high, add 1 T olive oil, and fry patties in batches, adding oil as needed. We made ours about 2-2.5" in diameter.

Serve with baby greens, or with rice. I also think it'd be awesome with oven fries, another thing we've been eating a lot on this diet.

---

Post-script: David and I were talking after about how we are so snobby and had never had salmon from a can before. Without missing a beat, he slipped into Fred Armisen's Portlandia character, reassuring me to not worry, he had gone and met the fish before (Fred and Teddy), they were wild and free-range, etc., etc.

A pumpkin round-up: savory and sweet

Before November is over, let's talk about pumpkin for a little bit because YES PLEASE.

1. Pumpkin chili

This chili is decidedly savory and (big surprise) I love it. It is vegetarian as written but I think it'd go great with meat, which is how I'm going to make it today. Kayla - who brought us the tomato paste freezing tip in a previous post - blends the canned tomatoes before adding them, which definitely takes it to the next level.

I highly recommend doubling the recipe and making jalepeno cheese cornbread muffins to go alongside!

2a. Roasted kabocha salad

Trying out another recipe from Vegetarian that I have had bookmarked (literally, ha) for a while. I always steal the kabocha from the tempura pile; it's absolutely my favorite pumpkin (so starchy!).

2b. Oh wait, this is my favorite pumpkin:

Sweet, savory, and tangy.

4. Pumpkin bread

Kathy loves to reminisce about the pumpkin bread I made six years ago when Kenny helped me cut and roast sugar pumpkins and we made the bread from homemade puree.

(It also didn't hurt that I put chocolate chips in the batter.)

We love using this Orangette recipe, but we cut the sugar in half so we can enjoy putting the (optional?!) chocolate in it. I've written it as a doubled recipe (so you can use up a can of pumpkin, or if not you can make the pumpkin chili, see point number 1 above) so you can do one loaf plain (which a lot of our family loves) and the other with chocolate and/or walnuts. We decided we like chocolate best, no walnuts.

Pumpkin Bread with Chocolate Chips
adapted from Orangette

3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
2 t baking soda
1/2 t baking powder
1 1/2 t salt
1 T cinnamon
1 t ginger
1 t nutmeg
1/2 t cloves

2/3 c water
1 t vanilla

12 T unsalted butter, at room temp
1 1/4 c sugar {this is halved from Orangette's recipe}

4 large eggs, room temp
2 cup pumpkin puree (if making homemade puree that is thinner in texture than canned pumpkin, you can reduce the water above)

1 cup chocolate chips

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease two 9x5 loaf pans.

Whisk dry ingredients together.

Beat butter until creamy, about 30 seconds, then add sugar and blend until lightened in color, abut 3 minutes. Beat in eggs one at a time.

Add pumpkin puree, and beat on low speed until just blended.

Add flour mixture in three parts, alternating with the water-vanilla mixture in two parts, beating on low until smooth and just combined.

Fold in chocolate and pour into pans.

Bake for about an hour, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Let cool in the pan on a rack for five or ten minutes before unmolding to cool completely on the rack.

Friendsgiving 2016

I gotta put together a slap-bang post before Thanksgiving because sometimes done is better than perfect.

Although, perfect is: this beautiful sign that Kayla made for our Friendsgiving last Sunday with all the young families from church.

Less than perfect is: the quality of my pictures. I really need to clean off my phone from grubby hands. (You think I'm talking about my children, but I'm not.) (Although! Emilyn has been doing the cutest thing which is to put her play phone to her ear whenever we say, "Hello?")

The party was a huge success and I wanted to share some of aspects I thought made it so.

It was a potluck, and the Evite "What To Bring" section enabled us to guide people towards covering all the necessary components to a complete spread. 

I divvied food up into smaller "bites," if you will, so that people could pick and choose a couple things together if that was easier than tackling a big item. 

Asking someone to bring cider and a bag of ice guaranteed that our drinks would be cold, even if they wouldn't be refrigerated during church. I also separately requested a 1/2 lb decaf beans to be brought.

I'm learning to delegate, because even when it's a potluck, there can end up being a lot of last minute purchases that add expenses for the host. This way you have margin to splurge on other fun (or necessary) ideas that come up later.

David and I provided the turkey, and since this was a casual gathering, I felt the freedom to not have to present a beautiful (some have called it "stunt") turkey at the table. This would have been really challenging anyway, seeing as the function immediately followed service on Sunday.

So, we roasted the turkey on Friday (since David was off then but had to work on Saturday). I have never before made a turkey in such a relaxed ("not agitated" to be Earnest) manner. It was marvelous.

At 4 o'clock on a relaxed afternoon without any company expected, we got to eat the crispy skin off (ha) and then when it cooled, we sliced and refrigerated the meat to be warmed up in gluten-free (i.e., just corn starch, no flour) gravy in a crock pot on Sunday morning. Crock pot FTW again.

Pro-tip: multi-purposing cups as name cards.

The only other elements of "structure" (I really had to restrain myself here) were a Mad Lib and a brief sharing of everyone's highlight of the year and a challenge of the year.

decorations? activity? "agenda"?

There were four babies in the group that had been born within the last year so the majority of the answers to highlights and challenges was babies. (We laughed when we discovered repeatedly that so many people's "favorite activity" on the Mad Lib was sleeping.)

Kayla was an awesome co-host and I personally had a blast doing this with her. When everyone left (which was late, another good sign), I noticed that I felt so filled up, both literally and figuratively.

Happy Thanksgiving!

P.S. If you need more, check out our 2014 Thanksgiving or revisit the letter I wrote mysef aboout hosting parties.

Falling for wintery foods

(First of all, what?! Okay, that said...

...) I'm often disappointed with traditional beef stews, finding them too acidic or even tinny tasting, and not beefy enough to boot.

But there is one version that never fails, and that is Ree Drummond's Sunday Night Stew.

Her pictures are way more gorgeous, her sauce more deeply mahogany, probably because I use chicken stock where she uses beef.

My favorite part of this recipe is the turnips - different, but oh so good, a wonderful contrast texturally to the beef.

It also doesn't hurt that Ree serves the stew on top of mashed potatoes that have been whipped with a stick of butter and a carton of cream cheese.

I highly recommend that you allow your rule-following (at least when it comes to recipes) spouse to make the mashed potatoes so that he can use the full amount of fat and you don't have to see how much goes into it to make it so luscious and heavenly.

(And this is why we all willingly fork over our hard-earned paychecks to cafes and bakeries, so we don't have to see all the good bad stuff that goes into everything that tastes amazing.)

Bonus: Pro tip from my friend Kayla is to freeze spoonfuls of tomato paste (because you NEVER need a whole can and it ALWAYS goes to waste) on a sheet pan, par-freeze it, then transfer to a ziplock in the freezer so you always have little dollops of paste when needed. You're welcome.

---

Another meal we tried this week was Winter Albondigas Soup:

And finally...

• Reading 168 Hours by Laura Vanderkam. It's surprisingly provocative for me personally, enough so that I might need to do a book report (aka another post) on this. As a teaser, know that I have woken up at 5 a.m. (!) for the last two days and gone walking! (I took advantage of Daylights Savings Time to make this shift.)
• Enjoyed this post on 7 Steps to Internet Sanity
• Appreciated this follow-up article from Stephie to my question about cookbook club.
• Love this quote by Cyril Connolly: "Better to write for yourself and have no public than write for the public and have no self."

Get ready for a bunch of randoms.

Lucky Peach Presents 101 Easy Asian Recipes is seriously the bomb. No deep frying, no sub-recipes (i.e., recipes whose ingredient lists are themselves things you need to prepare). Irreverent, bold, nerdy, lazy, pan-Asian. Basically everything I am. I was already sold, and then it came out and used the word "subparenthetically" in the middle of a parenthetical! What the what?! I need.

David and I both finished Scary Close and loved it. (Eunice, I'm sorry I'm so late to the e-book game. For the life of me I could not figure it out two years ago when you gave me a free copy!)

I have also been bawling my eyes out over Lost and Found, the episode on the Liturgists where Science Mike and Michael Gungor tell their stories of their losing their faith. (It's taken me a week and I'm still in part 1 because of all the crying breaks.) This was the first time I've heard the term "deconversion." I resonated with almost everything they are talking about, and it's so validating to have intelligent people articulate some very complex and nuanced and vulnerable things. I also chortled when they talked about Donald Miller and Rob Bell being "dangerous" authors to a Southern Baptist.

Speaking of Bell, listening to Velvet Elvis and enjoying it so far. (The audiobook is actually read by the author, who is, in this case, a great reader. But David listened to Scary Close and the reader - not Don Miller - was not a good match for the book. Alas.)

Annoyed by The Couple Next Door. Shame on me, but I skipped the middle section and read the end. I never do that kind of thing. Oh well.

Also enjoyed The Power of Habit and the perhaps controversial Love Warrior.

Absolutely slayed by my Enneathought a couple of days ago:

Today, explore the issue of boundaries. As a Six, are your boundaries too rigid? Can you trust people to get close to you? Can you share more of your feelings and ideas?

(Yes, Kayla, that was what inspired my notebook entry. ;p)

Invented this dish of steamed tilapia over silken tofu cubes with black bean sauce. We loved the layered textures. (It felt analogous to the Asian carb-on-carb-ness of potatoes and rice as well as reminiscent of Fuschia Dunlop's avocado over silken tofu appetizer.)

Had a super eggplant week with Persian-style eggplant dip and miso-crusted eggplant (both from Liana Krisoff's Vegetarian*), and then yu-xiang eggplant with grass-fed ground beef (amazing!). *Kind of trying to do a cook/book club with this. Slai, can you please give me more details on how you guys did yours?

Finally, gearing up for Thanksgiving season. What are some creative ways you guys are thinking of celebrating Thanksgiving this year?

Without overthinking

Well, after simply identifying the problem last week, I was able to bite the bullet and meal plan without overthinking. It was really nice to have a fridge full of stuff to cook, and it was super therapeutic - as it almost always is - to actually do the cooking, once I had decided what to make and had the ingredients to do so.

Roasting a pan of vegetables is always a good idea, especially when you have kabocha from your CSA.

A bag of dried garbanzo beans prepared in the crock pot was turned into four different things: hummus, radish greens pesto chickpea salad, pumpkin soup with harissa, and saag with chickpeas.

Speaking of the crock pot, it worked wonders for us this weekend, allowing us to eat well but not be too weighed down by time in the kitchen when we had lots of housework to do, like cutting down our maple tree (sad day, but now there's more of a view of the other trees...and the freeway)...

... and picking up a quarter cow from a nearby farm.

The best meal was a pot roast made in the church-lady-potluck tradition: cream of mushroom soup and a packet of onion soup mix. Don't worry, I didn't do this with our grass-fed cow from the farm. But still, this is seriously the best way to make a roast if you're going to do it in the crock pot the ultra lazy way without even searing it. And the leftovers made awesome sandwiches with mayo and red onion.

(I am now writing a post in my head about my love for sandwiches, which I have recently discovered in my adult life, but which white people have always known about. So to really talk about it might be the Asian analog of whitesplaining (thank you, Slai) the beauty of drinking hot water.)

And then on Sunday morning, because lunch after church is pretty much the most chaotic/hangry point of the week, I tried out my friend Valinda's suggestion and we did chicken tacos in the crockpot. I just added salt, taco seasoning, and about one cup of chicken broth. On high for ~3 hours (when you're at church) and it was perfect. Easy peasy and delish.

Also, per Christine's awesome post on welcoming fall, we lit candles for dinner to start our Sabbath, which we experimented doing from 5pm-5pm Sat-Sun this past weekend.

Now I've got to plan for this week ahead. Do you guys have any no-fail favorite crockpot meals?

Ooh, also, I've completely forgotten about linking this awesome article my friend Kayla sent me about a month ago on crappy dinner parties, and which we've been participating in ever since. It's been the best thing ever.

P.S. Some follow-ups to last week's randoms:

1) Wearing shoes from the time I wake up until after dinner definitely made me more productive, and on the days I did it, I hit my 10,000 steps goal without even trying.
2) All things pickled FTW. We finished the watermelon radish, peppers, and red onions so fast. So good for anything that needs a little extra somethin'. Or just straight out of the jar because vinegar is my love language.
3) In the middle of the Liturgists episode on Spiral Dynamics. So confused.
4) David and I watched the first ep of This is Us through NBC.com and loved it!

P.P.S. Since drafting this post, I read and made this in the crockpot tonight. It was amazing! And, in the words of one vegetarian who took some home for her daughters, "I think I eat meat now."