Sunday, March 11, 2018

Some food experiments

This weekend, I've been playing with some things that I haven't made before. 
Yesterday, at LOML's urging, I tried my hand at pho.  I'd not had a great deal of success with Vietnamese food in the past --- the results always turned out too subtle for my tastes, and without the Asian notes that I wanted and expected.   The recipe I tried, a simplified version, used store bought beef broth rather than spending a day making a (super expensive) slow version from bones and meat.
I thought that it turned out really well: everyone loved it, and it's going in to my keeper list.  When I get a chance, I'll put up the recipe here (as always, I used several recipes online, decided what bits I liked, what I didn't, and mixed and matched).
Tonight, I made pad thai.  I'd only ever made it from packet kits before (and truth be told, to an extent I did tonight too: I used a jar of "pad thai sauce", since none of the stores in a 20 mile radius seem to stock tamarind).   It too turned out really well: Boo was skeptical, and took only a small portion to taste, then immediately returned to the kitchen to fill her plate a little better.  Skibo claimed to like it, but as is his wont these days, only ate a bit.  I'm looking forward to him developing a teenage appetite, even if it does eat us out of house and home!

Yours, with a south-east asian inspiration tonight,
N.