Pan fried noodles, and the difference good soy sauce makes

So my fruity loaf friend and I discuss food and share recipes as well as sharing pictures.

The ants on a branch recipe is one we've both made, he more times than me (with pictures!).  First time, he used a better than average dark soy sauce, 2nd time he used something a bit more mundane.  He declared the first effort far superior, and pooh-poohed the common-off the shelf soy sauce.

Much to my dismay, as I was fairly certain that included my own!

Thus began a search for better soy sauce.

And more recipes, in order to try out my purchases.

Which leads us to pan fried noodles, with beef and snow peas.

Ok, not beef, since I prefer buffalo.

So, pan fried noodles with buffalo and snow peas, and foofy soy sauce.

It's awesome.

I'd happily eat the noodles and sauce, plain.  Yum!

Baconing the sweet.

It's a trend, lately, to put bacon in sweets.  Savory, sweet, salt...It makes sense.  If you've not tried a dark chocolate bacon bar...They're interesting. I can't say good, but definitely interesting.  And crisp bacon in maple syrup is divine!

Thus far, I've resisted the trend.  Despite encouragement, begging, even threatening, I've not made bacon chocolate chip cookies.  I've kept the bacon away from my brown butter toffee blondies.

But, like all good lines in the sand, this too was a place I knew I'd one day tread.

The Hungry Engineer leads the way, with Bourbon Bacon Blondies.  Booze, bacon, and toffee blondie?

Yeah, I went there.

I enjoyed.

I might even make them again.

And try out the bacon brownies.

Oh, and check out the lovely new bar pan!!!

And those lovely new plates, too!

When one gets a gift...

I love books in general, cookbooks in a specific, and cookbooks from awesome far away places...Well.  Giddy begins the explanation of my reaction to getting books as gifts.

A very dear friend of mine spent the holiday season in France.  She, being a brilliant woman who knows me very well, got me a French cookbook.

I love it.

Thus far, I've made two recipes from it, and will be adding to the list as the year goes on, particularly since so many French recipes include sauces.

This evening, I made Croque Monsieur. Basically, this is the foofiest of grilled ham and cheese sandwiches ever.


Layer thin sliced ham, béchamel sauce, and grated cheese (emmental or gruyère,  which I used) between two slices of white bread, dry fry in a pan.

Here's the sauce in the pan. The addition of Dijon mustard pairs this well with the ham.

The recipe said to put the ham directly on the bread, but I worried the ham, directly on bread, would prevent the sandwich from sticking together, so I slathered a bit of sauce in between.

Dry grilling (ie, pan fry, minus oil/butter/mayo) provides a lovely toasty color in addition to melting the cheese, thickening the béchamel into the bread.  I prefer the vertical slice, Hubbin likes diagonal.

Pair with sliced apple, and you have a classic French fast-food meal!

No soup for you!

Ok, I'll share if you want some.  And show up in time, since it's tasty enough not to last long.

Broccoli Cheese Soup in a bread bowl, ala Panera Bread.

I copped out and bought the boules, but next time I'll make my own. I decided to make these and didn't want to wait for the sourdough starter to grow, didn't want to cop out and use a pain regulaire (seriously, that's what the bread book calls it, not even the French book at that).

So this is probably the most challenging cream based soup, since it involves creating a roux.  It was lovely--thick and creamy, just a hint of color.  I was very pleased.  Next time...less nutmeg.  It tasted fine, and if you're using pre-ground nutmeg I'm willing to bet the quantity is fine, but with fresh ground...WOW! Strong nutmeg flavor.

And unrelated to the soup...Wow, not impressed with the pictures!  Not sure why the camera was unhappy with focusing, and I just did a crap job of framing up the shots.  Meh.  Here's Puck, with his 'meh' face on.

So this is part of another goal.

I'm aces at baking.  Seriously.  Cookies, cakes, pies, breads, muffins...Sticky and sweet, crisp and buttery. Me, sugar, flour, and butter can go wonderful places.  I can handle frying and baking and grilling a variety of meats and vegetables, too.  Casseroles, pizza, all things I am confident making.

Not so when it comes to soups and sauces.

I spent the last year mastering a basic sausage gravy.  And still end up with something that has to be eaten right away or it crosses the line from 'gravy' to 'sausage jello'.  Which, while tasty, is still kind of eew.

2010 will be the year of soups and sauces, culinarily.  I'm continuing to bake, that's just a given.  But making soups I'm proud of is a goal.  Sauces that don't curdle and break...I'm hoping.

One step closer.

Butternut Squash Soup

The recipe called it a 'curried' soup, given the presence of some curry powder.  I shan't argue, but I think it's more an afterthought than a significant component in the flavor.  Topped with cashews and coconut.  The coconut is wonderful, the cashews don't contribute much.  The recipe is from Food Network magazine by Ina Garten, but the version in the magazine substitutes chicken stock for water/apple cider.  I think next time I'll use vegetable stock instead, and maybe some coconut milk.

It was deemed (by myself and my husband) as good.  :)

More food.

Coconut banana bread.

Ok, it's food...

But this is more about taking the picture than making the dish.  A fellow foodie is taking up the challenge in his own way--he's going to take a picture of something every day.  I shan't out him here, unless he says I can (hint hint!!!) but out discussion today prompted me to take some more time in taking my pictures, and to add 'take better pictures' to my goals for the year.  I take a LOT of pictures, and usually end up with a couple that I like.  I think if I took more time to frame my shots, learned to use the camera better...Maybe fewer pictures would end up languishing in folders long forgotten.

Dinner presented me with some pretty contrasting colors...And the following shots.

Plain, simple...but the fork looks odd and I'm not happy with the flash shine. And I failed to clean the bowl, so there's a splotch of sauce within the blue.

 

Probably the best shot. The fork is more obviously a fork, the blue is clean of sauce and cheese, close enough to get detail without being as pr0nish.

 

Changed the angle a bit.  Left picture might be okay with some cropping, since the the bowl is awkwardly floating.  Right hand picture is ok, lighting doesn't really show the color as well, and the shadow from the fork bugs me. A lot.

Focus? Or not...

 

And the best of the close up shots, I guess. The cheese has a nice melty look, you can see the texture on the zucchini and there's a teaser of pasta peeking out from the carrot.  The fork is superfluous, but it doesn't really detract from the shot, maybe contributes a smigeon of depth.

Future photography efforts will include something other than food.  I promise.  Probably cats.  Maybe fish.  Flowers.  Beach stuff?  Oh...and important note...You can clickify the images to imbigginate them.

Edit:  I was given permission to out the Fruity Loaf!