Asian Cuisine

Belly of zen

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It’s been awhile since I’ve done much in the kitchen. During the holidays we were so pressed for time that we had to live on unsatisfying pre packaged food just to fill ourselves, but that hell is over or at the very least reduced. I bought a bunch of vegetables today and made soba noodle bowls with a cucumber salad and some pot stickers on the side. I would have made my own sauces but was sorely lacking in the soy sauce dept, fortunately I had my emergency Asian sauces to save the day!

It felt good to eat a healthier meal, plus its been so long since I’ve done anything Asian. Everything had the right amount of seasoning and spice to it.

Now to plot my next dinner menu…

Yin and Yang in the kitchen

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I have dinner duty for the next few nights. I started early this morning by making a nice Korean/Japanese marinade, and I let them soak until the evening. This was my first time working with Gochujang (a spicy Korean chili bean paste), it has quite the kick to it. There was also lime juice, garlic cloves, sugar, soy sauce, mirin (sweet sake), rice vinegar, ginger, and Korean spice powder with just a couple touches of salt and pepper. The end result is a sweet spicy steak, in fact this would probably taste great on beef too. Of course you can’t live on meat alone…

To compliment the spiciness of the steak I made a cool Korean cucumber salad with shredded carrot, toasted black sesame seeds and a ginger sesame soy vinaigrette with garlic, spring onion, Korean and Japanese spice powders and a touch of sriracha. Then of course there was white jasmine rice, one of my all time favorite rices to use.

I would count this dinner definitely among one of my better ones, but then when it comes to Asian cuisines I always seem to get the savor and spice just right. I’m not sure what I’ll do tomorrow. I have beef fillets defrosting, if they’re not ready tomorrow I may use shrimp as a backup plan…