Bento Box

Week 6 of 52 Weeks of Cooking is all about Japanese food. Unfortunately, I didn't get any decent photos, but that's fine. The food tasted good, at least! This week involved making a few different things, but none of them was difficult. Most of them should also be able to store well in the freezer,…

A slightly healthier potato salad

The theme for this week is Roots, and while most of these aren't "true roots," I view this as an "are tomatoes a fruit or a vegetable"-type question and will be going by culinary definitions. Stews seemed like the obvious choice, but I've had too much soup lately and wanted to go in a different…

Orange Seitan

I've been following along the 52 Weeks of Cooking challenge this year. I did basic soups for the first couple of weeks, but thought I should try something more challenging this week, and what could be a better fit for Salt Fat Acid Heat than a dish like Orange Chicken? I also decided to stretch…

Super Inauthentic Pizza

This is only pizza in the sense that I put stuff on top of a circular piece of dough, but I think it tastes good and de gustibus non est disputandum. So, here you go: Dough Ingredients (for a 12" pie) 200 g bread flour 130 g water (65%) 4 g yeast (2%) 4 g…

Cannellini Beans with Wilted Greens

It has been incredibly hot lately, but I didn't want to limit myself to salad so I had to find a recipe that involved a minimal amount of time by the stove. When I found this recipe, I knew I had my answer. It took a little while for the broth to boil, but after…

Creamed Greens

Creamed spinach was never a staple when I was growing up. I ate it at potlucks or at other people's houses, but I don't remember ever eating it at home. But reading Three Squares gave me the urge to eat something with white sauce, and a CSA box full of fresh greens made this seem…

Matzo Ball Soup

This time of year, soup seems like an absolute necessity, and matzo ball soup is a perennial favorite. This recipe took a bit of experimentation. The soup recipe I grew up eating comes from a box (not that it isn't delicious!), and the first recipe I tried resulted in a mixture too wet to shape.…

Proper Chinese Hotpot

When I visited China, one of my favorite dishes was suantangyu (酸汤鱼): a hotpot dish with fish in a sour broth. It's famous in Guizhou province, especially in Hmong communities. Our hosts were worried that it would be too sour for us, but I thought it had a very balanced flavor. Of course, back in…

Cold Weather Salad

Sometimes, even in the middle of winter when absolutely nothing is in season, you still want a salad. Luckily, cool season crops like romaine lettuce aren't expensive this time of year! I made this for a potluck, but if you're cooking for yourself, keep in mind that this makes a huge salad. Ingredients 1 lb…

Fail-Bread Bread Pudding

So I failed at making bread a while back and I didn't want to throw it away and completely waste it. Looking at the shape and the dense crumb structure, I think the issue was that my starter wasn't quite active enough when I mixed together my ingredients (I thought, "it looks fine so I'm…