Yummy Sushi

Just a quick post on a foodventure trip that i made to Yummy Sushi at Ewing, NJ. This was my second venture and i was very pleased with what pbear and I got.

Shrimp Gyoza: very light and flavorful. The dipping sauce was a nice complement to it

 Calamari Tempura (I forget the japanese name): It was very crunchy and the calamari wasn't overdone. The spicy mayo was amazing with it!

 Lady in Red: sushi with shrimp tempura inside and salmon on top.

 Not sure what its called, but we liked it... ;)

Stress correlation

So past few weeks have been really busy and stressful. One after another there was something that came up. I think most of it is over now and I can finally get back to the regular schedule....hopefully. Ah ... how I miss having a schedule, just a plain old schedule. Stress is correlated to so many consequential effects that I cant even start to talk about it. But one thing though that stands out the most is that my bad eating habits are directly proportional to stress. The most stress I have, the more I falter and eat. Usually, I eat a lot of Chinese food (fast food kind) when I am stressed. Its gotten to a point that I correlate Chinese food with stress. When I'm in a good mood, Chinese food is like ehh.. more like nooo... I guess that can be a good thing...i think.

I do think eating should be an activity where savoring and enjoying are the necessary requirements for it. But also for that requirement to fullfilled, the stress factor should be eliminated from the face of the earth.. haha...just kidding. It think it is possible even with stress. I think ;)

Over the weeks, I did some cooking and photography so there are plenty of recipes to share. The recipe today is for a simple tuna fried rice with and Indian flavor. The star ingredient used is a 'curry leaf' (more info here --> curry). There are small green leaves that are widely used in South India for seasoning various curries and stews. What basil is to Italian cuisine, curry leaf is to south Indian cuisine.

Oh ..... and just for those wondering, the 'curry powder' used in traditional American and British markets do not have any curry leaf.

TUNA FRIED RICE WITH OLIVES

Ingredients:

1. Tuna (canned, I used the one with oil)
2. Brown/White rice (1 cup)
3. Onion (1/2 medium, cut into small cubes)
4. Mustard seeds (1 tsp)
5. Curry Leaves (3, cut into half)
6. Green Olives (according to taste, separated from the liquid)
7. Salt & Pepper
8. Oil (1.5 tsp)

Method:
Get the ingredients ready

In a pan, pour oil. Heat. Add the mustard seeds to the oil. Heat until the seeds sputter.
Add Curry leaves and saute for a minute in medium heat. Make sure it does not burn or turn brown.

Add the onions. Saute until it turns transparent

Open the tuna can and drain the excess liquid. Throw in the tuna in the pan

Add some diced olives to the pan and saute.

After a minute add some black pepper and salt to taste. Stir

After two minutes add the cooked rice. Stir for about 3-5 minutes and serve

There is also an option to add ketchup or hot-sauce while cooking, but i prefer it on the side.

Visual Tasting

Pbear and I grew up watching a lot of Disney movies and one of them was the famous story about Rapunzel (most probably..we watched it loong time ago ... haha). So when mama Rapunzel was pregnant with Rapunzel, she had this monstrous craving for a root vegetable. And of course in her state she only wanted to have that vegetable and of course it was grown in the good old witches' backyard.

So papa Rapunzel, worried about mama Rapunzel went to steal some of the vegetable. He eventually got caught by the witch and made a secret agreement with the witch that he would give away Rapunzel in exchange for mama Rapunzel's life....

So what we want to focus on here... is not on the story but on the vegetable. Yes the vegetable! Strange thing but Pbear and I always wondered what it is (even after growing up) and why mama Rapunzel was so darn crazy about it!

Of course about 10 odd years later we found a very similar looking vegetable. And it turned out to be a radish. We don't do radish at home, in fact the last time i had it was about 7 something years ago. Not that we hate it, but no one really thinks of it. But looking this thing from our memory and just how pretty it looked, we had to get it!

  So just a small background on this thing of beauty. This variety of radish is called "cherry belle," an appropriate name indeed :). It is also known as 'Mooli' in Hindi. It is widely consumed in asian countries like Japan, China, Korea, India etc. An interesting article on the radish 'culture' over the world can be found in this link-a. 

There are also a lot of health benefits relating to this vegetable some quick summary can be found in link-b. I wish it was also effective for the good old cholesterrrrroollllllllll.... but alas

link-c : tips on how to select a good bunch of radishes

link-d : last but not least some more recipes. (See mine first!  ;) )

SIMPLE ROASTED RADISH

Ingredients:

1. Radish (2 to 2.5 cups after cutting)
2. Potato (2 medium)
3. Green Bell Pepper (1 medium, optional)
4. Ginger (2 cloves, crushed)
5. Oregano (1.5 tbsp)
6. Olive oil (2 tsp)
7. Salt, pepper

Method:

Wash and cut the radish, bell pepper (missing in the pic...whoops!) and the potatoes. They should be the same size

 Mix the oil, garlic, oregano, salt, pepper

 Mix all the ingredients and bake at 455F until the vegetables are crispy (i think it took 30-35min for me)

Before cooking, we tasted the radish raw and it had a very mild flavor as compared to its other white relative. Apparently the leafy portion of the vegetable is also edible (of course we came to know later on :) ).

After baking the potatoes and the radish went well together and the bell pepper too.

Happy cooking!