Friday Night Out

On Friday evening we went out to our favourite local restaurant, Bombay.  The food was spectacular as usual, and they added some new menu items, which we were excited about.

We started with an appetizer to share.

Christopher ordered the reshmi tikka, and I ordered malai kofta.  We both got an order of garlic naan on the side.

We can't wait to go back again! 

After dinner we went out to The Artful Dodger to see our friends' band, The Fortunate Isles, play.

It was a fun way to end off a long work week.

How was your weekend?  What did you do Friday night?

Thursday Things

1)  We were at the Asian grocery store on Friday to buy ingredients for our Thai weekend, and we came across this gum: 

It was good for the first minute or so, and then it just became awful.  It also made my purse smell like stale potatoes and gross basement.

2)  We also came across this soap:

We didn't buy it.

3)  Last nights dinner - tuna casserole!  We love this stuff!

                               

4)  I took my dad out for supper the other night to Slow Food Pub.  We each had pizza and a pint, and both took home leftovers for lunch the next day.

5)  We were having a problem with fruit flies coming into the house through the screen when the window was open.  The Internets told us to put apple cider vinegar in a bowl, cover it with plastic wrap and poke some holes in it.  We made a few of these, and they worked alright, but we discovered an even better method!  If you put a bit of red wine in a bowl, cover it with wrap, and use a toothpick to poke holes all over, you'll catch waaaaaayyy more fruit flies than with cider vinegar!!

Fruit flies are pretty smart ... they know that red wine is where it's at!

6)  New McDonald's menu in Thailand.  Cool!

7)  I came across this Halloween costume the other day and had to hold myself back from buying it ...

8)  Rainy Fall day today ...

9)  This was how part of my weekend was spent:

 
I haven't seen the Star Wars movies, so Christopher is making me watch them.  We watched Episode 4 on Friday night, but I fell asleep in the last half.  I tried to tell Christopher that I "got the gist of it" and that we should move on to Episode 5, but noooooo, he wouldn't let me get away with that.  We re-watched the second half.

10)  How excited are you for Breaking Bad on Sunday!? 

What are your Thursday things?

Chiang Mai Noodles

On Saturday evening we cooked more Thai food.  We started with shrimp Tom Yum soup ...

Next up Chiang Mai Noodles.

I loved the deep fried noodles that we tossed on top, along with deep fried onions.  They were crispy, and complimented the soft noodles and chicken beneath. 

 

Chiang Mai Noodles

(* This recipe is quite brothy so you could use even more noodles, or even have some rice with the extra sauce).  Adapted from Beginner's Thai Cookbook.

Canola oil (for deep frying)
500 g fresh noodles (we used Shanghai)
1 yellow onion, thinly sliced
2 green onions, sliced
1/4 cup cilantro
1/4 cup red curry paste
2 garlic cloves, minced
1/4 tsp turmeric
1 red chili, chopped
2 cups water
400 ml coconut milk
3 chicken breasts, thinly sliced
1/4 cup fish sauce
1 T soy sauce
2 T palm sugar
2 tsp lime juice
2 T cilantro (for garnish)

Heat oil in a wok on medium.  Fry 100 g of the noodles (NOT all of the noodles) until light brown and crisp.  Drain on paper towel.  Fry the onion slices in batches until lightly browned.  Drain.  Discard oil or strain and reserve for another time.  Combine the fried noodles, fried onions, green onion and cilantro in a bowl and set aside until serving.

Heat a bit of oil in the cleaned out wok.  Cook the curry paste, garlic and turmeric for 1 minute.  Add the water and coconut milk.  Boil and reduce slightly.  Reduce heat and add the chicken.  Cook 5 minutes, or until done.  Add fish sauce, soy sauce, sugar and lime juice.  Cook for a couple more minutes.

Place the remaining fresh noodles in a heat-proof bowl.  Cover with boiling water and separate with a fork.  Drain.  Divide noodles in to serving bowls.  Top with chicken curry mixture, and then top with fried noodle mixture.  Garnish with cilantro.

What is your favourite Thai noodle dish?  Do you like Thai curries?

Obsessed

I'm pretty much obsessed with Christopher's breakfast potatoes.  They are a weekend necessity around here, and we had them both Saturday and Sunday morning this past weekend.

Close up!

 

He chops and boils them first, and then cooks them slowly in a pan with oil, fresh herbs, some dried herbs and spices, and hot paprika paste.  They smell amazing and taste even better.

On Saturday we enjoyed them with a veggie omelet (we shared a 2 egg omelet) and bacon.

Sunday, it was breakfast sandwiches with horseradish mayo, mustard, tomato, chicken, and bacon.

Mimosas, coffee, and fresh juice rounded out our breakfasts.

Do you make breakfast potatoes or hash browns? 

Thai Weekend

On Friday after work we headed to the Asian grocery store to stock up on supplies for a weekend of Thai cuisine. 

We started with homemade fresh rolls and peanut sauce.

We steamed the shrimp for the fresh rolls over the lobster shells that we were boiling for seafood stock.

Then we had beautifully flavoured, steamed shrimp, and a lovely stock for our curry:

For the main course we had a seafood, zucchini curry.

Seafood Zucchini Curry

1 tsp shrimp paste

1 T peanut oil

2 T yellow curry paste

2 cloves of garlic, minced

2 tsp fresh ginger, minced

1 medium yellow onion, chopped

1 stick lemon grass, chopped

1 red chili, chopped

2 cups zucchini, chopped

1 cup seafood stock (we boiled lobster shells, then strained this)

400 ml coconut milk

2 cups seafood (we used shrimp and squid)

3 lime leaves, torn

1 T palm sugar

1/2 cilantro, packed

2 T lime juice

Serve over jasmine rice.

Wrap the shrimp paste in foil.  Heat a pot, toast the foil wrapped paste in the dry pot for about 1 minute per side, then unwrap, discard foil and add oil and paste to the pot.  Add curry paste.  Stir.  Add garlic, ginger, onion, lemon grass, chili and zucchini.  Soften.  Add stock, coconut milk, lime leaves and sugar.  Boil.  Reduce heat and simmer.  Add seafood.  Cook, covered for about 5 minutes.  Add cilantro and lime juice.  Serve over rice. 

Do you like Thai food?  Have you ever made Thai food at home?  How was your weekend?

Weekday Dinners

We've been making pretty delicious dinners all week.  On Wednesday we had ginger noodles with broccoli and chicken.

I cooked up the chicken in some sesame oil, with garlic and fresh ginger.

Meanwhile, Christopher made his epic ginger noodles (fresh ginger, soy, oyster sauce, sesame oil, green onions).

Then we tossed these together and sprinkled sesame seeds on top.

LOVED this dinner.

Last night the Korean in us came out, and we whipped up shrimp kimchi jigae and tteokbokki (dukboki).

We crumbled seaweed into the jigae ... the seaweed made us do it.

Happy Friday friends!  What are you up to this weekend?