Yesterday the sky glowed orange, the sun appeared either a faint yellow dot in the dark sky, and confused crickets chirped mid afternoon; at 2 in the afternoon it was as dark as late twilight. This was a result of lots of smoke blown high in the atmosphere above us and a lower marine layer or fog and haze... Very eerie and emotionally draining...
Yet I'd marinated 2 lbs of pork chops according to a recipe in Hawker Fare for Septembers cookbook challenge. The cookbook is the story of a Lao refugee, now the chef at a well known SF restaurant of the same name. There's more recipes than story, and many of them with ingredients that are not easy to get in a pandemic. I did manage to find some Lao fish sauce online, which is a nasty pungent thick version of the Thai fish sauce we're more familiar with; but mixed into a sauce or a marinade, it's pure salty umami. So in the early evening, I made some rice and cucumber salad using cukes from the garden, and we braved the apocalyptic skies, grilled the pork chops (moo ping) and served them with a spicy dipping sauce. I'd make this again, for company!
There's also a beef rib satay recipe that I'll expect to make before the month is out; I'll try to cook the egg salad and maybe another dish as well. Next time I'll try to get pictures.
Beef Satay from Hawker Fare; there was enough satay sauce for chicken satay later in the week |
For my birthday, DH bought me FIVE NEW COOKBOOKS! I'm sure we'll see some dishes from these in the near future. We've been eating very well and I take this as a compliment to my recent cooking endeavors.
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