I drove to work in the mild foggy wet, car windows down and radio turned up loud, with a hint of January thaw in the air. This, and we’ve hardly had anything frozen… yet.

In the office, we had the windows open, chasing out the stale air. It felt like a breath of spring in the middle of the winter-that-wasn’t. I was unsettled all day.
I wished I could come home and throw open every window — plant a garden — even clean the house!

Because I work in the travel business, this is how the unusual aurora news greeted me in my email. The photo alone is enough reason to follow the link:

Planes Rerouted.

This solar storm is/was the strongest in 5, 6, or 7 years, depending on which news outlet you check with. The aurora forecast even predicted a chance for sighting as far south as Boston. Alas, it was cloudy all night; no northern lights to be seen here. While waiting and hoping for the skies to clear, I cooked. What else

Dear ISG’s recent post of Rustic Chicken Curry had caught my eye and I had some chicken, so supper was a breeze.

I learned a thing or two while making this. I washed the chicken in turmeric and water as instructed. Then I dried it thoroughly with paper towels before cooking.
I sprinkled it with more turmeric too, while browning. These steps seemed to bring the chicken to another level.

I had a few small potatoes, so I used ISG’s cinnamon and cloves whole with the seasonings, and added my favorite potato masala before the spice paste.
I think I should have used ALL of the dried red chiles, as I found the end result a little mild(??) for me

Nevertheless, this is a keeper — thanks for the yummy recipe, ISG!

ISG’s delicious rustic chicken curry with goda masala, potato, and every last drop of coconut… yum!

We’ve been in the deep freeze here, with nary a snowflake to be seen. Tonight there is a light snowfall at last, and it is still falling as I type. I’m happy to see it softly blanketing the frozen grass. This means great birdwatching tomorrow morning ~ the feeders are full and I’m hoping for a siskin or redpoll to join the usual suspects.

I was in the mood for something really spicy to ward off the chill, but I wasn’t in the mood for a ten-step evening in the kitchen. Plenty of eggs on the counter and plenty of onions too, hmm…

Here’s what I whipped up.

Eggs with Spicy Gravy

6 hard boiled eggs, yolks removed

For gravy, spray a pan with non-stick spray* and fry:

1 big onion, roughly chopped
1 inch ginger, roughly chopped
3 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
1 sprig curry leaves
1 big green chile, slit
2 dried red chiles

Fry until onion is golden brown and starting to stick to the pan. Remove to a bowl and set aside.

browning the onions etc

To the pan, add:

1/4 c coconut (mine is frozen finely shredded)
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp coriander seeds
1 TB chana dalia

Dry roast this mixture until browned and fragrant. Remove and set aside. Don’t wash the pan.

roasted coconut and spices, fried onions and chiles, tomato

Grind the onion mixture and the coconut mixture up together (yep, skipping steps, lazy lazy…) Add 1 c water to the grinding bowl and rinse the residue — reserve this water.

Now heat 1 scant tsp oil in the pan. Add 1/2 tsp cumin seeds and 2 red chiles. Fry 2 minutes, then add 1 small chopped tomato. When the tomato starts to soften, add the ground mixture. Cook five minutes, stirring, then add:

1/2 tsp red chile powder
1/2 tsp turmeric
1/4 tsp methi powder

Cook a further 2 minutes, then add the reserved rinsing water and a very small bit of jaggery and mix well. Bring to a boil and cook 10 minutes, stirring. Add the egg whites.

Voila! Quick and spicy eggs

note: the addition of methi may seem strange — I did not add this initially but when I tasted the gravy, it was lacking something — I tossed in the methi on a hunch and that was the missing link!

*Non-stick spray can be substituted with a couple of sprays from an oil spritzer — I’m trying to avoid excess oil and this treatment makes the onions brown up nicely.

they’re getting along swimmingly!

~~~~~~~~~~

My sister and I went to a Top Secret Location on the weekend. Feast your eyes, and see if you can guess where!

disclaimer: I did my best to keep people out of photos, but on the busy weekend it was not so easy. Any appearance of you, your family member, your best friend or next-door neighbor is strictly unintentional! My goal was the food not the folks

entrance with worker serving up fried king trumpet mushrooms, gift boxes of mandarin oranges, persimmons, giant fuji apples and asian pears

just a few of the dozens of kinds of tofu, with a few bean sprouts thrown in for good measure

wide view of produce section

the giant korean radish section

hot and spicy kimchi alley, also many prepared specialty dishes in here

a smattering of the pickles and miso on display

fresh noodles, yum!!

rice (ok, this shouldn’t shock anyone)

overview of seafood section, frozen in foreground, fresh counter off in distance to the left, where they will fix your selection Any Way You Please. I have seen fresh kingfish here… hmmm

frozen dumplings ~ some of about a hundred varieties! various Asian specialty seafood and meatballs, sausage, etc fill the upright cases.

myriad dried noodles, from japan, china, korea, vietnam, and more

even more dried noodles!

dried shiitake mushrooms, some in fancy gift packs

condiment central ~ one of the endless aisles

the fabulous food court ~ lunch anyone!?

~~~~~~~~

This is truly only a taste of the wonder and delight your local Top Secret Location has in store (no pun!). If you’re lucky enough to live near one, run, don’t walk, especially on a weekend, and be sure to get there early and have a small bite of breakfast before you leave. If you’re a foodie like me, it will take you at least 3 hrs to get through the place, and that’s on the first visit.

The preferred plan of attack, developed over several months of experimentation, is to arrive around 10 am on a Sunday (not as crowded as Saturday). This is sufficiently early to secure a parking space, but not so early that you’re tired and cranky by the time they start whipping out the endless free samples. If you don’t get enough for lunch that way, you can haul your purchases out to the car and come back for lunch at the food court. I highly recommend the soondubu Stop by the bakery on the way out for a mini-loaf of pan bread or a green pea pastry, and perhaps just one last bite of the sweet persimmon samples as you head out the door…

I tried to get a snapshot of that tropical fruit sample table as we were leaving, but a manager-type caught sight of me (what, after 2 hrs in there taking photos??) and sternly ordered me to put my camera away. He did not, however, confiscate my camera — so while my evil plan of stealing trade secrets lies in pathetic ruins, my ultimate goal of the epic tour is realised.

One of my (ahem) “New Year’s deals” with myself is to expand my culinary repertoire. Let’s call this deal #1, which is proving something of a challenge when combined with deal #2 in which, ideally, I exhaust the stores in the pantry!

One thing I am fully stocked up on is green jackfruit.

I love love love green jackfruit, although I have only tasted it frozen or canned.
I have seen the imposing fresh fruit — huge, whole, piled high in a giant carton at H-mart; those however, were ripe. I dream of finding a fresh unripe specimen;
I can only imagine that elusive taste treat. I know I will love it.

Perhaps someday, the H-mart buyers (are you listening, dear H-mart buyers!?) will smile upon me. It’s good to have dreams!

Meantime I thought I should break out of the jackfruit mold I’ve created — sambhar and Solai’s delicious pirattal are the only jackfruit dishes I can whip up without looking at a recipe. While I love them both — deal #1 says New Year, New Dish, yes? Yes!

In my quest, I happened upon this charming website. I went in through the back door via You Tube, promptly took off my shoes and stayed awhile.

While I did follow the recipe, right down to making the ginger-green chili and mustard-red chili pastes, I must confess that I did add potato to the original, accustomed as I am to the two together. Also, I reduced the amount of oil to a scant 2 tsp — this in keeping with (my omnipresent) New Year’s deal #3 which states: while shrinking my pantry, it wouldn’t hurt to shrink *me* a little too!

ginger-green chile paste and mustard-red chile paste ~ mixie, mortar, and pestle are packed away and the kitchen-aid does not make a luxurious paste, especially with these tiny mustard seeds, but the taste did not suffer!

frying the dals with aromatic curry leaves and ginger-green chile paste

add the tamarind…

stir mustard-red chile paste into the jackfruit and potatoes ~ almost ready for lunch tomorrow!

yummy mini oat bran pitas make a convenient substitute for chapatis

Chewy jackfruit, creamy potato, crunchy nutty dals, tangy tamarind, pungent mustard, spicy melange of chilies and just a hint of sweet from ginger = heaven in my vantillu!

I loved this recipe video narrated in Telugu with English titles and I know I will be watching more — what a great way to learn a little bit of a new language.
So, Happy New Year Gayatri, and thank you for the delicious recipe!

yep, this is how I often cook — with makeshift recipe card in hand

Before the New Year I promised to post kohlrabi sambhar, inspired by Anita’s delicious haak. Looking back in my archives I saw that the joke was on me —

I’ve already posted the very same, way back in 2009!

Well, it didn’t spoil by keeping — this is still far and away my favorite sambhar, aside from Suganya’s spicy sambhar, or Padma’s udipi sambhar, or roasted eggplant sambhar or oh, yum, jackfruit chips sambhar… ok, I admit it, there is no such thing as favorite sambhar. Happily there are endless varieties to try!

This is quite a lame excuse for a post, using all these old links, but it’s fun to delve into the past, and next time I promise something more original. At least I’ve kept my promise to myself — get back here and post *something* before another week flies by. This weekend, perhaps a field trip to the new Wegman’s is in order! Now that would be something to get excited about

To redeem myself, here are a few belated photos from late summer in Michigan’s glorious Upper Peninsula…

birch trees on the shores of a small lake ~ late afternoon in the upper peninsula

a lone loon glides along…

in the distance, a great blue heron stalks the shores of that little lake

contemplating supper…

landscape of northern lake huron shore near les cheneaux islands

flora of northern lake huron

a small island in northern lake huron

a closer look

monarch on goldenrod ~ north shore of lake huron

monarch on goldenrod ~ north shore of lake huron again

one of my favorite boats ~ the classic laker Herbert C. Jackson! just managed to catch her upbound to the Soo; here she is in Lake Munuscong, the area where the St. Mary’s River empties into Lake Huron

No trip to the Upper Peninsula would be complete without an agate foray!

an unusual agate from lake superior ~ it looks blackish but it’s actually green and white

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Is it global warming, or just cyclical oddity? My daffodils are coming up in the backyard; it’s been an unseasonably warm fall and early winter.

Yesterday the weather finally turned cold — not just here but up and down the east coast — strawberry farmers in Florida were setting ice film on their fields to save the fruit, and it was 11 F on my way to work this morning.

Now it feels good to recall those lazy, hazy days of summer, melding into golden autumn.

By this time last winter, the ground was buried under two feet of snow; this winter we’ve seen only a few cold days and even fewer snowflakes — showing up most auspiciously, just for miss m on Christmas morning.

No little redpolls have come looking for my thistle seed yet, but good things come to those who wait!

A belated Merry Christmas, Happy Channukah, and all the other wonderful winter holidays I’ve missed — I have been busy boxing up books and glassware and weeding out old clothes — now that the college grad is finally set up in a good steady job, and the college sophomore is fully engaged at school, it’s time to get serious about trading in the old homestead for something more managable.
Could 2012 be the year that Michigan becomes reality? I can only hope!!

packing mess ~ my desk is under there somewhere…

Meantime, it’s been a wonderful Christmas; kiddies and kitties happily in attendance.

daisy loves the new tree…

cardinal topper strapped in and ready to go!

christmas eve ~ calm before chaos

Wishing you a happy and healthy New Year ~ filled with peace, joy,
lots of yummy kohlrabi sambhar (inspired by this, coming soon) and many wonderful winter finches!

male redpoll at the sunflower feeder ~ february 2011

another male redpoll waiting his turn

female redpoll ~ february 2011

mixed flock of redpolls and goldfinches ~ february 2011

A few weeks ago I saw this irresitible curry dish at Bong Mom’s Cookbook.
It was one of those drop-everything-and-cook-now moments, just like I had with Suganya’s sambhar a long time ago.

Sure enough, the dish was even tastier than it looked; I’ve made it 3-4 times since. I’ve made it as intended, I’ve made it with tofu in place of shrimp…

with tofu *and* shrimp…

I guess you could say I am hooked

Tonight I had a nice fresh piece of haddock but no ideas. I thought of S’s wonderful Goan Curry and decided to try it with the fish. I also had a few boiling (waxy) potatoes… hmmm…

While the onions were cooking I thought the potatoes might be good in the curry. By the time I got to frying the spice paste, I had diced the potatoes and tossed them into the pot. That was a throwback to New England clam chowder, in which you cook the potatoes in the clam broth base so they absorb the flavor. By the time the spice paste and tomatoes were well-cooked, the potatoes were about half done — perfect! Time for the coconut milk. Since this was fast turning into ‘chowder’ I made it a little more liquid with water, and covered the pot to simmer until the potatoes were tender.

potatoes cooking in the spicy coconut milk broth

Had I been looking for a low-fat supper I would have put the fish straight in, but by now I was really into this chowder parallel. I shallow-fried the fish in a little coconut oil — o heavenly aroma!

When you add your fish to the chowder depends on how you like it done — I prefer my fish just barely cooked through, so I added it at the very end, turned off the heat and let it rest about ten minutes before serving. If you prefer your fish falling-apart-done, you could add it sooner and simmer awhile longer before the resting period.

goan fish chowder a la Bong Mom ~ fusion heaven in a bowl!

Oh, the delights of this tasty dish! The sharp and tangy bite of vinegar, garlic and chiles, mellowed by the rich coconut; succulent fish and melt-in-your-mouth potatoes, all swimming happily in an aromatic sea of goodness.

All I need now are a few oyster crackers — but I never was a fan of oyster crackers… some rice will do even better.

muthu samba rice ~ I still think it looks like sugar…

So to recap, this is nothing more than Bong Mom’s wonderful Goan Shrimp Curry with fish fried in coconut oil in place of shrimp, and a few potatoes cooked in the spice paste.

If you haven’t tried the original recipe yet, don’t wait another moment!

tantalizing and addictive ~ Bong Mom’s goan spice paste

Thanks for the fusion inspiration, S!

And to S in NH — thanks for the new garden

I’ve heard of bunnies at the garden gate, but turkeys?!?

fairly sure this is a juvenile golden eagle with either a raven or a crow chasing it ~ hard to tell from a photo so far away but check out the size of
this amazing raptor!
mission point, soo, mich.

lee a. tregurtha, upbound mission point

gorgeous male eastern bluebird enjoying the sunny new hampshire spring

When I feel a bit disjointed and out of my comfort zone, it’s the little things in life that appeal. It could be an unexpected song on the radio, an unexpected bird in the tree, an unexpected boat at the Soo, or an unexpected surprise in the kitchen.

I don’t deny that I often retreat to the kitchen.

While I can’t always control what’s going on around me, I can control what’s going onto my supper plate! Sometimes I should control that a bit more

muthu samba rice

For the longest time, I looked for seeraga samba rice that ISG talks about
with her delicious chicken biryani at Daily Musings.

Like many of my questions, it garnered me strange looks every time I asked:

“Pardon me, do you have seeraga samba rice”?

“What’s that madam, some nice basmati rice today”?

“No, I’m looking for Seeraga Samba rice, it’s very small, from the south of India, smaller than sona masuri”, I tried in vain to explain.

“Oh, yes”! (a little startled) “we have sona masuri rice, come right this way”!

At which point I smiled and gave up.

I forget where I finally stumbled upon a 5 kg bag of not seeraga, but at least samba rice. Of course I brought it home, but it had to wait until my open rice was finished before I tried it. While waiting, I checked through my cookbooks and googled, finding very little about this Muthu Samba rice I had purchased.

muthu samba rice

Interestingly, I found a large source of information right around the blog-corner at Food In The Main.

I came across Shammi’s first post — uh oh, now I’m a little nervous to cook this rice…

Then I read the follow-up post — sounding better, but I’m still a bit timid…

So the samba rice sat and I busied myself with other things… things that didn’t require rice. I was procrastinating, one of my true strengths!

Then came tonight, eve of the long weekend!
Both the kids are away. There’s nobody to cook for but me, and I wanted some comfort food — what else but sambhar!
That meant rice, so out came the muthu samba at last.

I opened the bag and oh, so gingerly, stuck my nose inside. Whew — nothing to worry about, smells like rice. I poured most of the contents into a lovely new container purchased just for that purpose. The tiny little grains looked for all the world like raw sugar, sparkling in the light. I tried to capture that with the camera but I did not do it justice.

is it sugar, or samba?

That was all it took for me — trepidation disappeared and I was excited to cook the baby grains.

I googled the manufacturer and basically followed their recipe to cook the rice.

I rinsed one scant cup of muthu samba and drained it for 30 minutes. Rinsed again and drained a little longer. Placed in a large saucepan with about 1 2/3 c water, brought to a boil, lowered the heat to lowest setting and cooked, covered, ten minutes. I turned off the heat and, steeling myself for the moment of truth, carefully opened the lid..

hmm… it looks like rice…

Ok, there was a new aroma, but I would definitely not call it unpleasant. I waved off that steam, fluffed the rice up with a fork, and recovered. Let it sit another 10 minutes or so, uncovered and waved off that steam. This time I tasted and honestly, I found it delicious. Almost like silk, those tiny pearls of ricey goodness. Hooray!

I chose a strong veg for the sambhar, just in case — fresh collard greens (next best thing to kohlrabi greens), chopped well and cooked right in the dal. I tossed in a few dried jackfruit chips for good measure. Of course this cooked up so green that it was more like dal saag, but with the usual treatment of tamrarind and sambhar powder, it tasted good enough. Something about it reminded me a little of gongura dal. Since I’ve been reading about Ethiopian cooking and the classic dish gomen (collard greens stew), I added a wee bit of korarima (Ethiopian cardamom) at the last. We’ll see what that tastes like tomorrow!

muthu samba rice with very green sambhar

Here is an interesting and seemingly thorough treatment of many rice varieties.
I can’t vouch for the veracity of the info, but scroll down to the samba entry and find a reference to aforementioned Shayamala

So there you have it, one humble opinion. Muthu Samba will definitely be eaten with relish here, and I don’t mean the hot dog variety (though I can’t wait to have this rice with pickle!).

In the words of my darling daughter, “peace out”!

eastern bluebird again

S and C (of New Year’s feast fame) and I have been trying to get out to an Ethiopian meal for ages. Yesterday we finally made it.

On a lazy Saturday afternoon at Habesha, we were nearly the only diners out and about — all the better as the lone waitress was able to shower us with attention. Smiling kindly, she expertly answered our questions about the menu. When she brought out the meal, she patiently explained everything on the edible tablecloth. When we couldn’t eat another bite, she didn’t mind our little quibble over who would bring home the leftovers. Once that was settled, she even indulged us by bringing over the entire selection of Ethiopian bottled beer for our perusing pleasure (six varieties — who knew!). That’s five-star service!

S and I are neophytes; C is well-versed in the wonders of Ethiopian dining so we relied on her advice. Along with her food recommendations, she suggested the t’ej — honey wine.

Drinking it, I felt a kinship with the ancient gods, upon whom this slightly sweet adult beverage made such an impression. It had a heady, lip-smacking quality that made me feel I was truly tasting nectar. It was the perfect complement to the (mildly) spicy portion of our meal. I can see where it would be an excellent foil for these dishes when they’re spiced up to par and not moderated for the American palate.

Aside: is it me, or does that down-spicing often happen at ethnic restaurants?
Not at the H Mart food court, it doesn’t! I dare you to try the soondubu!
Yep, that’s on my to-do list in the near future.

But I digress…

We didn’t eat at a mesob, for which I was grateful. When I clumsily fumbled the first few bites of stew-laden injera, the regular table was there to catch the drips. The injera was layered on an enormous tray, and this injera was the real deal. None of that white-flour injera here, but the greyish spongy bread made from teff — one of the smallest grains in the world and very nutritious. Now grown in the US, it is more readily available here (Bob’s Red Mill sells it in grain and flour form; someone was kind enough to track it down for me so I have some waiting, to try making injera on my own {and oh my! see the afterward for still more teff!}).

Upon our injera was the artfully arranged Habesha Special — from their menu:

“Split peas, lentil, spinach, cabbage, potato, green beans, salad, doro wot”.

The simplicity of this menu description belies the amazing complexity of flavors that awaits. Hearty green beans mingled with sweet carrots. Fresh salad, tangy with vinegar, sat alongside mellow cabbage with just a hint of spice. Yellow split peas were cooked to a creamy mash and lightly spiced with garlic. Spinach was in fact, I believe, collard greens, but without that harsh brassica taste — rather, a melt-in-the-mouth concoction, glistening with a healthy dose of spiced clarified butter.

All of this and more gave way to the irresistible doro wot, a rich dark-red chicken dish redolent with slow-cooked onion, garlic and berbere.

When my friend S called ahead to check the open hours for our little luncheon foray, she sent an amusing note stating that there had been a slight communication gap; she did not speak Ethiopian. Yesterday I learned that the official language of Ethiopia is Amharic. I don’t speak Amharic, but the universal language of good food shared with good friends is alive and well in New England.

The whole experience was fabulous — if you’ve never gone out for Ethiopian, give it a try! I loved it so much, I had to bring home an order of gomen (greens) for supper. From that moment, I knew I was treading on dangerous ground; I could sense a new obsession coming on and sure enough, when I got home, I started googling. I may have to wait awhile for authentic berbere, but there were several dishes easily made with things on hand (as it happened, I didn’t have to wait long at all — see afterward).

For the two dishes I cooked last night, I used olive or canola oil and reduced their quantity considerably. I did use a little ghee for the veggie stew. Other than that I pretty much followed the linked recipes. I’m very new to this cuisine so I don’t know how authentic these were, but they seemed like good candidates for a beginner.

freshly blanched veggies

Yataklete Kilkil (Ethiopian vegetable stew) with modification — I used half ghee and half oil, and seasoned this with ground cardamom and nutmeg before sauteeing onions, green pepper, and chiles.

creamy yellow split pea stew

I also made this very mild, yet aromatic stew with yellow split peas.

a miniature ethiopian feast ~ vegetable stew and yellow split peas by me, gomen (greens) and injera by Habesha

~~~~~

Afterward:

I had occasion to pass through Boston today, and made a special detour to the South End Food Emporium. This is an expanded convenience store with a nice produce section; not unlike many in the city but with one important difference: tucked away in a corner is a little wooden shelf chock full of homemade and authentic Ethiopian spices.

With a hot cup of coffee in one hand and a bag of teff flour on my arm, I stared in wide-eyed wonder at the colorful selection packed into deli containers. A few of the names I recognized from my brief research, but others escaped me. The friendly proprietor saw me looking a little like a deer in the headlights, and came to my rescue. Relieving me of the bag of teff, he asked what I wished to cook. “Doro wot!” said I, and he handed me a container of berbere — the essential spice blend for Ethiopian stews (wots). “You’re here at the right time”, he said enthusiastically, “this is a fresh batch! It’s handmade by my aunt in her own kitchen and sent to us specially — eight different spices!”.

He mentioned that his aunt is 93 years old.
Seriously, could I be any luckier!?!

He went on to detail just how to cook the wot so it would taste best — type of ingredients, when to add them, method and so forth. He explained that I needed the more colorful mitin shiro, not the plain — that’s for children and not spiced at all. I could get by without Ethiopian black pepper — but the cardamom was worth purchasing because it’s not the same as the Indian varieties I have.

“Will you be buying the injera”? he asked — will I be buying the injera!? You have fresh injera!??! Of course!! But I said only, “yes” as if I had known about this all along. He told me to sprinkle the injera with mitmita and roll it up with cooked veggies or salad.

I’ve tried to write everything down before I forget, including the recipe tips so I can share them when I attempt doro wot.

After further discussion, I left smiling at my good fortune; happily laden with the makings of a little Ethiopian pantry and some invaluable guidance from a kind soul to boot. This should be fun!

injera from south end food emporium

authentic ethiopian spices!

I have discovered H Mart, practically in my backyard. Just down the road,
so to speak; a hop skip and a jump from my favorite Indian grocery haunts.
Oh joy!

ingredients for gaji namul ~ check out the one *pound* bottle of roasted, crushed sesame seed ~
on sale at H Mart for the paltry sum of $5

Shopping at H Mart is an experience in itself. To quote one Yelp reviewer
from last year: “There are Zip cars in the parking lot, that should tell you alot.
A trip to H Mart is not an errand, it’s an event”!

A giant produce section with every vegetable imaginable — on Saturday I saw actual fresh jackfruit, whole, as big as two footballs!
Oh, how I wished I had a knife big enough to handle one of those.
Oh, how I wished I had brought my camera!

Fresh bamboo shoots are available halved, sliced, cut into cubes or strips.
A myriad of mushrooms awaits; if you’ve ever wanted to cook with hon shimeji, beech, maitake — here they are.

The world is your king oyster mushroom at H Mart.

Usually they have brinjal, long Asian as well as smaller Indian; ridge gourd, silk squash, ash gourd, pumpkin, etc. Fresh peppers, hot and sweet, every Asian green you can think of, herbs, and tofu — oh, the tofu!

Meat and fish of every variety is sold as well — marinated, sliced in specialty cuts for what I can only assume are some of the hallmarks of Korean cuisine, and there is an entire section of prepared Korean side dishes — bracken, spinach, mushroom, you name it — and of course kimchi of all sorts… I could go on and on. Noodles, frozen dumplings of great quality without MSG, oils and vinegars and sauces, shelf upon shelf of seaweeds, even a small section with dals and various spices — although for dry spices I’ll take my Indian markets any day.

At any rate H Mart is a great place for retail therapy — not to mention lunch, with a food court and bakery right there in the store. Next time, I’m going to bring my camera.

Last weekend I was out hunting agates.

outfitted for the (agate) hunt against the elements at whitefish point ~ yes, it’s always windy and cold up there!

This weekend I was hunting for an authentic Korean recipe — a side dish in which quick-cooked spinach is seasoned simply with fresh garlic, green onions, soy sauce, and sesame. I stumbled upon Maangchi, whose infectious cooking videos — complete with eclectic music — reeled me right in. In addition to the spinach, I was enticed to make this eggplant dish, called gaji namul. I changed it up a little by adding fresh ginger and cilantro, as well as some fresh chopped bamboo shoot; but mostly I followed Maangchi’s recipe. It’s amazing on rice!

gaji namul ~ korean seasoned eggplant
it was so late, I had no time for a pretty presentation but trust me, it’s delicious!

Check out the original recipe here and the video here. Thanks Maangchi!

Requisite Michigan pics

the majestic Mackinac Bridge in waning sun

and a bridge of ice on the old pilings at whitefish point

millions of rocks, with maybe a few agates mixed in ~ storm front passing over lake superior

a yellow rumped (myrtle) warbler at paradise

a brick-red agate full of fine banding

looking down the makeshift walk ~ usually I have to reach over my head
to get those bird feeders ~ to the far left is the mailbox post ~ the mailbox is buried in the bank

We had a little snow. It was a magical treat to stay home and watch it fall.
Then reality came crashing down the street and plowed the driveway in.
Shovel, plow, reverse, repeat, if you get my drift — no pun intended!

After all that fun with snowblower and shovel, I was hungry for a spicy treat.
I was dreaming of masala dosa, but by the time the last plow rumbled off,
it was 9 pm. Who can start dosai at that hour?
Especially if you’re not an experienced dosa-maker!?

Then I remembered that ISG made yummy dosai out of oats and grits!

I had some 5-grain cereal mix in the cupboard but no time to soak it overnight. Why not grind it up dry? Why not, indeed.

It worked.

mixed cereal, before and after grinding

Easy Instant Dosa
makes one big or two smaller dosai

1/3 c Bob’s Red Mill 5 grain cereal (I suspect plain oatmeal would work too)
3 TB sooji
1 TB rice flour
water to make a thin batter
salt to taste

Powder the cereal (the little kitchen aid worked well for this).
Mix with sooji, rice flour, and salt. Add enough water to make a thin batter.

Heat your pan and add a few drops of oil. Sprinkle the batter around to make
a thin dosa. Cook on med-low heat until dry on top and browned on the bottom. Sprinkle with ghee if desired.

I think the next time, a little more rice flour or a little regular flour would make it better. But all in all, this made a rather nutty-tasting dosa in a jiffy.
Granted it didn’t *look* fantastic, but it was yummy, especially with the pickle!

easy instant dosa with potato palya and mango pickle

dark-eyed juncos ~ aptly nicknamed snowbirds

tough business, taking off and landing in a blizzard!