The Date Night Cookbook - Italian Shakshuka

I’ve recently gotten the Date Night Cookbook by the Try Guys’ Ned Fulmer and his wife Ariel for Christmas and I decided I would try my hand and one of their recipes. The appeal of this cookbook for me was that Ned and Ariel are just normal people, aka not professional chefs. So, a book of their favorite things to make feels much more doable than someone who cooks food for a living. These recipes feel easier to take on and honestly, i was hopeful that they would be appealing enough to Caleb that I would have ideas for what to cook us for dinner. This isn’t totally the case seeing as Caleb is quite picky but it’s given me a few more things to add to the rotation and some fun desserts I’d like to try and make to get back into cooking.

First up this fine morning, I decided to take on the Italian Shakshuka. I’ve made a Shakshuka before and thought it was fine. I used to see a café on campus in Chicago sold it around breakfast time and I was always intrigued but never got it. So here is my second brush at making a shakshuka and also my second taste at it.

A little unconventional for our breakfasts but I’m down to experiment. Everything in this was in Caleb’s realm too so I did manage to get him to share it with me as well. Score.

The great part of Ned and Ariel’s recipes are that they’re easy and quick. Throw some things together and boom, you’re ready to eat. In this case, you heat some garlic, onion, and chili flakes in a vessel and once it’s fragrant you add 26oz of crushed tomatoes and let simmer. They say to add basil, crack some eggs on top and season with salt. The Fulmers top it with feta and cover it to let the eggs steak for 5mins and it’s ready to go. Easy peasy. We also happened to have some tuscan garlic bread from Wegmans leftover so that was much better than regular white bread to dip in it. The eggs were a little over for us so our stove must run a little hot or I left it on a little too long (I do get a little nervous with baked eggs because they look raw up top but I have to live a little more free here for a better outcome.)

In the end, it was good, but not good enough to crave. It’s an easy dish to make and cooks fast with one dish quickly so I’m a fan of all of that but we’re not huge breakfast people so throwing this into the mix doesn’t seem very likely for us. I would recommend it though, I’m sure for some people, it would fit right into a regular breakfast routine.

FL - Litchi Delights!

We’re back for a limited time to see ALL THE FAMILY! And while we’re here in the Pines, we’re stopping off at Litchi. My cousin loves Litchi. He’s an honorary employee with how often he comes and how much money he spends at this establishment and recently the owners of Litchi Snow Ice have opened their own food spot, Litchi Delights (right down the plaza from their original boba location. So now that I’m here for a visit, we’re going to try out Litchi Delights and see what the fuss is all about

LOCATION: 15973 PINES BLVD PEMBROKE PINES, FL 33028

What really motivated me to come here was the signature foot-long fries!! Nothing screams Emily like a good ole potato and the novelty of a ‘foot long french fry’ is enough for me to make a dedicated stop. I’m sharing today’s snacks with my two cousins from Germany so we can have a little bit of everything and really test out the menu. We’re skipping on the ‘hibachi’ today for the ‘Asian snacks’ and a couple french fry toppings.

We decided to try the takoyaki and the Taiwanese-style popcorn chicken from their ‘Asian snacks’ portion of the menu and a couple of signature foot long fries one order with cheese and the other with their signiature sauce. For whatever reason, they gave us the fries with the sauces and toppings on the side but that’s fine with us. Our full group of 6 can be intimidating at once because we order a lot and it’s easier this way so we didn’t mind dipping instead of having the toppings on, especially since we were new to the fries and didn’t want to commit to the sauces if we didn’t like them.

Honestly, the snacks were alright. The fries were kind of disappointing because they’re quite oily and don’t taste like potatoes, just fry oil. From the way they ate, it seems like they were made into a potato batter/mash and then extruded into the fryer in order to obtain their foot-long length. This makes sense seeing as a potato isn’t typically a foot long in length to cut fries out of but it feels like there was a lack of seasoning in the potato mix at all because they just taste like oily air. The saving grace is that these end up being a vessel for for sauce or cheese but plain, it’s not a great taste. Even dipping it in a generic cheese sauce couldn’t save it and the signature sauce wasn’t anything to write home about. Thankfully, the Taiwanese-style popcorn chicken was seasoned well and flavored nicely as were the takoyaki which I always love getting at places.

In the end, Litchi Delights was a little disappointing, and while the staff and owners are nice and the establishment is clean and friendly, I think I’ll just stick to their bubble tea whenever I come to visit.

Sweet and Saucy Pork Chops

Homemaker Emily is here! Kind of.

I’ve decided to try to do better at cooking new dishes for us to try and add to our weekly rotation. It’s getting hard when all we cook is pasta or rice bowls. I’d like to order out less but that won’t happen unless I get better at meal prepping and planning. It’s not going to be easy at all, especially since Caleb doesn’t like beef or seafood.

This time, I figured I’d try to make Chris Morocco’s sweet and saucy pork chops. It’s a simple recipe with a few ingredients that I mostly had already and didn’t take much prep time in advance. Easy to make after a full day at work. This is adulting.

Chris also has a youtube video on Bon Appetit’s channel which is always helpful and encouraging to have just as a reference while cooking. I’ve had pork chops often growing up but they’re tricky for me to cook without drying out. They aren’t terribly fatty which is also good because Caleb doesn’t like the texture of fat and gets weirded out by bone-in meat sometimes so a boneless chop worked for this recipe and felt doable. I did deviate and left out the capers and rosemary just due to sheer laziness and I didn’t want to buy either and have so much leftover that wouldn’t get used again. Less waste but I’m sure this led to less flavor as well. A sacrifice I deemed acceptable. There’s still shallots, garlic, and red wine vinegar for a flavorful enough sauce that I felt confident about making my adjustments.

Overall, the recipe was easy to follow, it went well with some (pre-made) mashed potatoes, baked zucchini, and the timing of it all was quick. Everything came together well and the flavors worked. I really enjoyed the flavors of the red wine vinegar with the shallots and garlic, the pork was simple enough to cook following Chris’ directs, and I felt I was careful to not overcook it.

Unfortunately, Caleb wasn’t a huge fan and pork chops overall throw him off with their texture. So, while the flavor was good and would eat again, it’s a no-go on pork chops moving forward. I tried. It’s been a few attempts and none of them have been successful so while I like this recipe, I’ll have to keep testing other options. However, I would recommend this to other people to try. It’s pretty tasty and easy to make for sure.

CORT - Wild Ginger Asian Fusion

I’ve been watching too much food TV and too many youtube videos with people eating sushi because I’ve been craving it so often lately. I decided to splurge today too and get a super fancy roll because I deserve it.

LOCATION: 47 MAIN ST., CORTLAND, NY, 13045

Enter the special Yummy Yummy Roll at Wild Ginger Asian Fusion. I’ve seen this special on their specials board every time I walk inside to pick up my order but I finally noticed it online when I was ordering. The Yummy Yummy roll is lobster tempura, avocado, crab wrapped in soy paper topped with fresh mango. No surprise that it’s an $18 roll so this was a very special day and the only thing I ordered. Usually, I add shrimp nigiri to my orders to bump up the price and make it worth ordering online for me and for the restaurant but this was all on its own.

I was a little worried about the quantity I would be getting and assumed the lobster was the big price and it would only get 6 or so pieces. I was happily surprised.

I actually ate half of my order then took the photo so there’d be a cross-section to see what’s inside so this was a full 12pc order. 12pcs is definitely enough for me especially since these pieces were actually very very large (more of a two-bite situation for me per piece.)

Overall, it tasted great. I was nervous about the mango being too overpowering but they were actually great and it was a well-balanced piece. I will say, that while it was a solid quantity of sushi and it tasted good, I wouldn’t get it again. The flavors were good but not $18 worth, in my opinion. Lobster doesn’t add too much to the flavor and isn’t worth the cost in this instance. The mango added more to it than the lobster did and I just wouldn’t ever crave this flavor. Worth the try once, just to end the wondering if it’s good.

Pasta e Fagioli

It’s getting cold out and fall is in full swing so it’s soup season!!

My friend Julia makes soup every week when the weather gets cool and I’m super jealous of that consistency and the idea if having a ready to eat soup for the rest of the week for lunch or dinner. The problem I’m facing is that, while I love soup, Caleb is not a huge super person so I end up eating a batch almost by myself all week and boy, does it last. I swear soup is one of those things that you eat and eat and eat and it doesn’t look like you’ve even made a dent. It’s a small hurdle I’ll have to face this soup season, so maybe not soup every week but I’m going to try to make it more of a part of my meal planning schedule.

First up this year is pasta e fagioli from Carla Lalli Music. I first found the recipe on Bon Appetit’s youtube channel (remember when that was a thing?) and decided to give it a shot last year. It’s been great to make a few times and learn from the process and I feel like it just gets better and better.

I know Carla is huge about soaking beans and there’s a whole thing with it but honestly, I just bought a can of white cannellini beans and went with it. Sorry, Carla. I followed Carla’s process otherwise and pulsed carrots, leeks, and garlic in a food processor and reduced it in a dutch over with hot olive oil. I did find that it took me longer to do than the estimated times in the website but that’s okay. I did get a little nervous about it and rushed the process to fit what the recipe said but I should’ve taken the time to make sure it was right because the end result this time was a chunkier soup that we like but the flavor was all there so it’s a minor adjustment. Gotta follow my gut a little better in the kitchen. It can all still feel intimidating.

I did find a ham hock, to my surprise, at the grocery store, and that worked out well with the beans, kale (chopped finely) tomatoes, and a parmesan rind I saved just for this soup. I let it simmer, waited for the ham hock to get tender enough to pull off the bone and shred, then I cooked pasta on the side and served them together. Since I eat this over the week, I’ve figured out keeping the pasta separate until it’s ready to get eaten or a serving is packed up for lunch is the best way to avoid mushy noodles. There may be a slight miss in the melding of flavors by keeping the pasta separate but this is a choice I’m happy to make.

I actually really love the flavor of this soup and it feels really nostalgic and reminds me of something but I can’t quite put my finger on it. I’m not sure this is going to be in constant rotation because Caleb isn’t totally in love and it’s definitly hard to eat a full pot of soup by myself but it’s in the recipe box for sure, maybe its more of a once a season kind of soup.