Friday, October 7, 2011

cookin up a storm

I may not have time for much these days, but I'll be sure to cook up a storm every chance I get. Cooking is a hobby I picked up fairly recently. Five or six years ago, when I was going through a body transformation when I dropped about 50-60 pounds (that's a whole another story), a lot of the weight loss circulated around what I ate, even after all the running and excercise I was doing. So cooking became an integral part of my weight loss, although- I was doing a lot of quick on-the-go meals like shakes and salads- but then it was after meeting Paul I really broke out with the big guns. I always knew how to cook, from watching my grandmother and mother and father cook- and I paid attention to their careful instructions- but I think cooking is a combination of good sense and intuition. It's definitely an art. I've also been inspired by a lot of cooking shows over the years. I don't own a tv, but I've drawn a lot of inspiration from Iron Chef America, Emeril Live, and even a bit of Rachel Ray, whenever I'd be flipping through channels on someone else's tv. Subscribing to a few health and running magazines has given me an opportunity to pick up a few recipes here and there and it has given me some ideas to draw from. Also, dining at a lot of great, quality restaurants all over California and all over the world has helped me to develop a skill of detecting different ingredients in what I'm eating, and then fusing complementary tastes together in my own cooking to recreate new flavors. I don't really do cooking books, I've never been great at following precise instructions, so it's just from trying this or that and finding out what works. So it's a way to be creative, and you can control what you eat and how you eat it, by cooking for yourself.

Last week, I conjured up a wonderful southern, cajun-inspired meal that consisted of bread-crumb crusted polenta cakes, breaded tilapia, garlic-egg brown rice with fire-roasted salsa, and fresh broccoli and tomato salad with white peaches in creamy jalapeno dressing . If only you knew!







Doesn't that look delicious? It's healthy too. The bread-crumb crusted polenta was a nice touch. I've been searing pieces of polenta on a frying pan with a bit of olive oil, but that night it just occurred to me that it would be extra crunchy and tasty to roll it around in bread crumbs first before throwing it on the pan. And it worked. And rice should never be served plain. You can do so much by adding some garlic salt, minced garlic and cracking a couple of eggs in there. The salt really seals in the taste of the garlic and egg with the rice, and rice should always be brown for a guilt-free carb addition to whatever you're pairing it with. It's so much healthier.
*****
Last night, it was an indian-inspired meal that included egglant tikki masala, garlic-egg brown basmati and jasmine rice, steamed asparagus, bell peppers, celery, and asian pears dipped in edadame hummus, peach and broccoli salad, and tilapia with plenty of sriracha sauce for that extra kick. We eat mainly vegetarian, but the occasional fish gives us the omega 3's that we need.





Cooking is an art, and it is a hobby. I hate that I can't cook Mon-Wed because of law school, but at least from Thursday-Sunday nights I can put my culinary skills to use. Food should never be eaten processed and should always be fresh. I haven't decided what I'll be cooking tonight, but that is also the fun part. It's fun to look inside a fully stocked refrigerator and pantry and allow my creativity to take me to a place where I can conjure up a yummy, healthy meal with whatever I have and just let it all come together. The result has never been disappointing.

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