12
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What have you been eating, drinking, and cooking?
What food and drinks have you been enjoying (or not enjoying) recently? Have you cooked or created anything interesting? Tell us about it!
What food and drinks have you been enjoying (or not enjoying) recently? Have you cooked or created anything interesting? Tell us about it!
My kids are off at my parents so we have been eating things they wouldn't normally eat.
The other day I made a fish curry and it was delicious. It had basa loins, shallots, garlic, peppers and a fair amount of butter and yoghurt. We had it with flatbreads.
We had ethiopian food one night, which is amongst my favourite genres of food. The local restaurant (The Warka Tree) is amazing, and we ate on the patio (yay for full vaccinations), and had the place to ourselves for an early dinner. I love injera, the spongy flatbread that comes with ethiopian meals.
Lunches have mostly consisted of breakfast burritos: scrambled eggs with veggies in a wrap. A simple, great lunch.
Tonight I'll be grilling some steaks and having a side salad.
I'm also a big fan of Ethiopian food. I live in a relatively small city and I feel very lucky to have access to a nice little Ethiopian cafe. The proprietor and chef will even set up a traditional Ethiopian coffee ceremony for small groups and it's something I would really like to try soon.
Before I was a vegetarian I loved injera with key wat, the oily spicy beef sauce/stew. Now I have it with spiced lentils and kale instead. It's still great!
I enjoy that the veggie dishes tend to be as good as the meat dishes at a lot of Ethiopian places that I've been to. And I'm also lucky having a good place within walking distance; the next closest good Ethiopian place I know of is ~6hrs away.
I wonder if they'll do the coffee ceremony here. The people who run the place are delightful, so they might do it if asked. A good long while ago, I was using an uber for something and the driver ended up being the son of the owner, and they're all just lovely people; every time I've been to the restaurant the hospitality has been more like "you are a friend, come in and enjoy" and less like "I am a waiter, what do you want".
I know what you mean about that vibe! There's a Caribbean place which is locally famous for that warm atmosphere, it's run by three generations of family with the matriarch grandma as the head chef. A lot of the menu items are called "Mama's [whatever]" in reference to her, and the wait staff all call her "Mama" too. It's a great place.
Apparently Snoop Dogg ate there, and of course the first time I went I ordered what he ordered, I believe it was jerk chicken wings. They were so spicy they made me cry... won't make that mistake again, haha.
I have been thinking about good Caribbean for a while. The last time I had good Caribbean food was in the Caribbean. Maybe once Covid is over and we get back on our "vacation out thataway" plan, which fell through last year, I'll hit you up for restaurant specifics.
I'm super jealous of you and @rogue_cricket. I love Ethiopian/Eritrean food as well, and when I lived downtown TO I was within walking distance of a great E/E restaurant (which sadly doesn't look to be there anymore). And it was also just a quick TTC trip up to the Danforth which also had (and still has) a ton of them too (ever been to Rendez-Vous? 🤤)... but now that I live in the boonies outside the GTA, the closest E/E place I know of is a 1.5hr drive away in Guelph. :(
I haven't been to Rendez-Vous - I'll have to check it out some time. I've been to a few places downtown, and I never enjoyed them as much as the local place here, or the one I used to enjoy in Ottawa, but maybe I'll give them a shot some time; thanks for the recommendation!
The Guelph one is certainly worth a stop if you're ever out this way for some reason.
Oh, hah. For some reason, I didn't make the connection until now! And based on your recommendation, I will definitely have to make an effort to get out there to give it a try, preferable some time soon. It's been far far far too long since I last had injera and some good wot. :(
My fridge broke down and because of unfortunate circumstances I can't get a replacement right away, so I'm on a fridge-less diet, which surprisingly isn't as terrible as it sounds; there's still a lot of things you can can cook even without a fridge, but no leftovers allowed is a bit of a pain. And butter, I want butter.
Like eggs, butter doesn't require refrigeration.
It's quite warm so it gets really soft, not very nice.
I'm not sure I'm seeing the downside... Do you have something specific that calls for hard/chilled butter?
I eat butter with bread mostly (besides cooking), I like the texture of cold butter.
Ah, textural preference certainly warrants cold storage then. Thought you were just going without butter unnecessarily.
Have you considered getting a French-style butter crock? You put cold water in it, and refresh that cold water occasionally (or can even put some ice in it too), and it should be able to keep the butter cold for quite some time, even without refrigeration.
That could be a solution yeah, I've been doing that with drinks.
I've been eating an absolute tonne of eggs lately and I almost always pair them with some kind of spicy sauce. I've used regular hot sauce (various kinds), buffalo sauce, sriracha, gochujang, and sambal, but this last week I picked up some Chinese-style chili oil from a local market and I think it might be my new favourite egg topping. It's spicy and savory, without the vinegariness of hot sauce that I'm not always into. I like using the solids and there's just something so attractive about the colour, too.
I definitely want to try and make my own now! The stuff I bought is good, but I want it to have a bit more of a kick.
I've got a lot left. I've used it on noodles also, but if anyone else has ideas for what to use this stuff for I would be open to them.
My wife and I did tacos al pastor starting from Serious Eats' recipe - al pastor are my favorite type of tacos by far, and this recipe is excellent. I know it's not quite traditional, but I'm considering trying to smoke the meat next time we try this.
My wife and I have been experimenting with different styles of street tacos. This past weekend we made pineapple and honey chicken tacos that were fantastic. Took all of 20 minutes to make and only needs about 5 ingredients: chicken, honey, pineapples, garlic and soft tortillas.