Stuff Portrait Friday: Specialty Dinners, Staples, and Appliances
Audrey is visiting her Grammy and Grampa for a few days this week, so I did not have enough people around to justify making my specialty dinner, which is the first part of this week's SPF (of Random and Odd fame). So I thought instead I would just take a picture of the recipe card.
My mom always said you can tell how successful a particular recipe has been by the quantity of stains on it. While that was certainly true for her (my mom is a fantastic and adventurous cook), I can't necessarily claim that for myself, at least for this recipe. This is my all-time favorite dish, and though the rest of my family does seem to like it, I would make it even if they hated it. It's comfort food for me, the one I always asked my mom to make for my birthday as a kid. Mom got it out of a magazine years and years ago, and though I have googled the name, Meatloaves Marinara, I never found anything even remotely similar on the internet. Perhaps now I'll be the #1 Google search for Meatloaves Marinara! In any case, I will try to remember to take a picture of it the next time I make it. And if you decide to try to make it yourself, I'll tell you my secret to changing it: 1) Garlic, garlic, and more garlic. One large clove is hardly even noticeable! 2) Double the canned tomatoes. The sauce is so good, even if it mainly is just pureed canned tomatoes, you'll want more than you'd get if you followed the recipe exactly.
Food we ALWAYS have in our house (this should not come as a shock):
We are rice snobs. Prior to living in China, I did not really care for rice at all. It did not occur to me that Minute Rice should not qualify as real rice until I had tasted REAL rice. And did you know there are many, many different kinds of rice? I don't just mean arborio, brown, and wild. I'm talking fragrant rice, sticky rice, red rice, black rice, and many many other varieties of white rice alone that I don't have English translations for. My only challenge has been turning my husband onto brown rice. I love white rice (REAL white rice), but I also love brown rice, and am of course aware of the health benefits. We compromise this way: when he cooks, he can use the white; when I cook, I can use the brown (though I also still use the white for some recipes). RICE IS GOOD. And don't think to yourself that you've had the white rice in Chinese restaurants and you still think it's just so-so. Most Chinese restaurants, though they do not lower themselves to using Minute Rice, do use a low-quality white rice to save money, probably since most Americans pile food on top of it and can't really taste the real flavor anyway. Really good rice is meant to be eaten by itself (though it is acceptable to put a small portion of your food on top of it...just don't DROWN it if you want to experience it the way it's meant to be!)
My favorite applicance:
Although I was tempted to post a picture of my microwave, as that's the appliance that gets the most use, I have to say our coffeemaker is my FAVORITE. Though I generally limit myself to one or two cups a day, it's a ritual I can't do without (thank you, caffeine addiction). A couple of months ago, the decanter on our old coffeemaker cracked, and it was old enough that we decided to buy a new coffeemaker instead of just replacing the decanter. Although I'm not crazy about the white (shows stains more, especially with our hard water), I do love the green glowing clock on it (which also tells how long the coffee has been sitting on the warmer, up to two hours). It's kinda funky, space-agey looking. And most importantly, it makes a mean cuppa joe.
My mom always said you can tell how successful a particular recipe has been by the quantity of stains on it. While that was certainly true for her (my mom is a fantastic and adventurous cook), I can't necessarily claim that for myself, at least for this recipe. This is my all-time favorite dish, and though the rest of my family does seem to like it, I would make it even if they hated it. It's comfort food for me, the one I always asked my mom to make for my birthday as a kid. Mom got it out of a magazine years and years ago, and though I have googled the name, Meatloaves Marinara, I never found anything even remotely similar on the internet. Perhaps now I'll be the #1 Google search for Meatloaves Marinara! In any case, I will try to remember to take a picture of it the next time I make it. And if you decide to try to make it yourself, I'll tell you my secret to changing it: 1) Garlic, garlic, and more garlic. One large clove is hardly even noticeable! 2) Double the canned tomatoes. The sauce is so good, even if it mainly is just pureed canned tomatoes, you'll want more than you'd get if you followed the recipe exactly.
Food we ALWAYS have in our house (this should not come as a shock):
We are rice snobs. Prior to living in China, I did not really care for rice at all. It did not occur to me that Minute Rice should not qualify as real rice until I had tasted REAL rice. And did you know there are many, many different kinds of rice? I don't just mean arborio, brown, and wild. I'm talking fragrant rice, sticky rice, red rice, black rice, and many many other varieties of white rice alone that I don't have English translations for. My only challenge has been turning my husband onto brown rice. I love white rice (REAL white rice), but I also love brown rice, and am of course aware of the health benefits. We compromise this way: when he cooks, he can use the white; when I cook, I can use the brown (though I also still use the white for some recipes). RICE IS GOOD. And don't think to yourself that you've had the white rice in Chinese restaurants and you still think it's just so-so. Most Chinese restaurants, though they do not lower themselves to using Minute Rice, do use a low-quality white rice to save money, probably since most Americans pile food on top of it and can't really taste the real flavor anyway. Really good rice is meant to be eaten by itself (though it is acceptable to put a small portion of your food on top of it...just don't DROWN it if you want to experience it the way it's meant to be!)
My favorite applicance:
Although I was tempted to post a picture of my microwave, as that's the appliance that gets the most use, I have to say our coffeemaker is my FAVORITE. Though I generally limit myself to one or two cups a day, it's a ritual I can't do without (thank you, caffeine addiction). A couple of months ago, the decanter on our old coffeemaker cracked, and it was old enough that we decided to buy a new coffeemaker instead of just replacing the decanter. Although I'm not crazy about the white (shows stains more, especially with our hard water), I do love the green glowing clock on it (which also tells how long the coffee has been sitting on the warmer, up to two hours). It's kinda funky, space-agey looking. And most importantly, it makes a mean cuppa joe.
posted by Andrea | 10:06 PM
3 Comments:
That's a nice coffee pot. I love mine too!:)
There's something so comforting about a well-worn recipe.
"It did not occur to me that Minute Rice should not qualify as real rice until I had tasted REAL rice."
THANK YOU!
I'm from Hawaii where, even if the meal include potatoes, bread, or some other starch, you still have to have rice. Even at breakfast. Just because.
When I went off to college, I was truly sad that I wouldn't have my own rice cooker. Thankfully, my girlfriend at the time gave me her mum's old one (with her permission, of course). It lasted me all through college and everyone who ate my rice agreed that it was better than any other rice they had ever eaten.
It always drives me nuts when people think that Minute Rice and Uncle Ben's are just as good. They're really not.
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