My Life as a Chef

The Menu

Food Quests

• World Chicken Quest.
• World Soup Quest
• Pizza Quest.

Vegetarian Dishes

• Spicy Chickpea Wraps
• Pozole Rojo

American

• Thanksgiving Turkey and Stuffing
• Turkey Carcass Soup
• NY Steak
• Slow Roasted BBQ Ribs
• Bacon Cheese Burger
• Gringo Tacos
• Korean Hot Wings
• Mushroom Swiss Cheese Burger

Mexican

• Pico de Gallo
• Carnitas

Caribbean

• Jamaican Jerk Chicken

SE Asia

Japan

• Soboro Donburi
• Tamagoyaki (Japanese Rolled Omelette) 玉子焼き

Vietnam

• Pho

Indian

• Tiki Masala Curry
• Butter Chicken
• Garlic Naan

Thai

• Pad Thai
• Panang Beef Curry
• Lemongrass Chicken Soup with Coconut Soup

Singapore

• Singapore Chicken

Indonesia

• Ayam Gorem (Indonesian Fried Chicken)

African

West African

• Galliina en Salsa de Cacahuete (Chicken in Peanut Sauce)

South African

• Sausage Rolls
• Roast Leg of Lamb
• Sole in Panko
• Pap and Gravy Fusion
• Prawns Peri Peri

Malawian

• Mango Chicken

Europe

England

• Steak and Mushroom Pie
• Cottage Pie

France

• Poulet au Vinaigre (Chicken in Vinegar Sauce)

Italian

• Making fresh pasta
• Marinara (Tomato Sauce)
• Meatballs!
• Spaghetti and Meatballs
• Meatball Sandwich
• Spaghetti with Clams
• Hot Italian Sausage with La Peperonata
• Cavatelli in Brown Butter Sage Sauce
• Fettuccine ai Tri Colori
• Tagliatelle with Braised Lamb Ragu
• Clam Linguini

Middle Eastern

• Chicken Shawarma Plate
• Palestinian Roast Chicken With Sumac and Red Onions (Mussakhan)

Fusion Dishes

• Mango Chicken with Coconut Rice

Breakfasts

• Dutch Baby
• Frittata
• Tamagoyaki (Japanese Rolled Omelette) 玉子焼き

Baking

• Boscotti
• Death by Chocolate

Bread

• Sourdough Loaf
• Sourdough Rye
• Breadsticks

Sandwhich Quest

• The Ultimate Reuben
• Roast Beef and Swiss on Sourdough

By way of introduction, let me note that I LOVE cooking. I watch cooking shows and often try things I have seen that look doable and sound good. I spent my childhood in the kitchen, licking baking dishes, carving melon balls, stirring pots as instructed, and generally monitoring both our maid Rebecca, and my mom, who were both busy cooking and baking for 6, or often as many as 14 on Sundays, or even more hungry mouths on special occasions. By the time I was around 10, I was often on oven duty and contributing to the food preperation. When I was in college, I got a job in a bakery, where among other things, I made the meat pies, scaled cakes, ran the criosant machine, and baked the croisants as well as performing many other duties as the bakers assistant. During my first marriage, Melissa, a stay at home mom, did 95% of the cooking. I was in charge of (read: “restricted to”) the BBQ. Frequently I made the salad often experimenting with dressings. Food in our house was not spectacular, although I I did try making a variety of interesting salad dressings. anyhow, the food was generally pretty serviceable, but nothing earth shattering. I used to watch the cooking shows longingly, and we would eat out for variety. When we split up, I resolved that I would learn how to make delicious food. As I started cooking for myself, I found that I had a real aptitude, and more importantly, I discovered that I really enjoyed cooking and baking. After Melissa and I agreed to split up, but before she moved out, she went on cooking strike one night. So, that night, it was left to me to make dinner for her, Mia, my daughter, and I. The dish I made was Posole. Both my ex-wife and my daughter said, “Wow, this is really delicious!” I also remember before we split up, we used to get a box of vegetables, and one box included Bok Choy. Melissa had no idea how to prepare them. I said, “I’ll do it. I grabbed garlic, mirin, soy and a inch of red pepper flakes. Her response was, “Man, this is so good, how did you know how to make them?” Once I was on my own, and cooking for one, I really began to experiment. I discovered a lane that my culinary sensibility lived in, and relied on recipes I found as a starting point. I remember when I moved out of my house into my first apartment, one of my first food quests was to learn how to make perfect pasta. It took me several tries till I got it right. I also paid attention to the chefs I watched on TV. I remember watching “Beat Bobby Flay” one evening, and the challenger was an older chef who had a pasta restaurant in NYC. As he was making his pasta dough, the host asked him what his secret was. He said, and I will never forget this, “Get as many yolks into the pasta as it will hold!” I heard that and began to experiment with how many yolks to use in my dough when I made pasta for 2. If you ask Heather today about my fresh pasta, she will tell you that it’s the best pasta she has ever had!

Heather came into my life in 2018, and from the beginning, as she licked one plate clean after another, she said, “You are a chef, own it!” So, on a gradient, I began to own it. I researched recipes, first in books, and then online. I tried various things, playing with temperature, flavors, salinity, heat and sweetness, often getting very ambitious, and little by little, the flavors I was able to conjure up began to consistently be very moreish! I began to take on more complex cooks, and became very adventurous, taking on food culture from around the world. My rationale was, “Lets explore food from around the world. It can’t be that difficult, we all cook with protein, carbs and fat!” I already had developed a high capsaicin tolerance, so diving into peppers was in my wheelhouse, anyway, I digress.

My culinary chops progressed over the past 12 years. For 7 of those years, I have cooked for Heather and I. She LOVES my cooking. The early days were fun as she became accustomed to my bold flavors. She is a trooper and my biggest fan! Now, her capsaicin tolerance exceeds mine! Anyway, we now approach food in a very specific way. We take time every Sunday morning to discuss our meal plan for the week. We select a 5 or 6 day menu, look up the recipes making sure that all the necessary ingredients are on our shopping list, then off we go to shop for the week. The one exception is that we normally only buy fish on the day we are making fish. We consider it a “perfect shop” when we do no backtracking in the store! If our menu is very ethnic, with SE Asian, Indian or Mexican meals in our plan, luckily, we have several GREAT ethnic grocery stores locally, including Mexican, Indian, SE Asian generally in addition to 3 major brand grocery stores, Safeway, Whole Foods and QFC, all of which are within a mile of our place, so it’s a rare day when we cannot find an ingredient.

What I am doing with this blog is cataloguing our eating experience, both to just make a recond of the things we have tried as well as to make the menu’s we enjoy easily accessible.

I hope you enjoy ur variety and feel free to ping me if you want to discuss a meal or an ingredient.

Neil