readsalot

Japanese class is over! I have free time again!

The final was last Tuesday, and I think I did ok--there wasn't anything on there that really surprised me, but I'm just not sure I got everything right. I know that I got one of the listening questions wrong, because I successfully parsed it several hours later and realized that the answer I'd given was the exact opposite of the right one. Oh well.

I went out to dinner Friday night with a bunch of classmates and Sensei. We'd originally planned to eat at Bluefin, but they were unfortunately closed due to a leak. So, we went to Kaya, since Japanese food was also available there. We had gyoza (good), agedashi tofu (good), potato croquettes (unbelievably yummy--where have you been all my life?), sushi (which I don't eat), jap chae (tasty), some kind of spicy fish soup (good soup, and good fish, but the mussel that was in my serving was kind of rubbery), and vegetable tempura (ok--carrot slices were too thick to have gotten cooked properly, but the other vegetables were good).

Food diary: I didn't cook anything last weekend, because I was still using stuff up from the previous week. The previous week I made braised chicken with soy sauce, orange peel, and star anise from Molly Steven's All About Braising. I'd made that before, and this time I doubled the sauce ingredients so that there actually was some sauce to spoon onto rice. That worked nicely. I also made a coconut chicken curry from Nina Simond's Asian Noodles, which I've made several times before--you make a curry paste from various spices and ginger and garlic and such, fry it, add cut up chicken, cook a little more, then add coconut milk and finish. Fairly easy, and very nice.

Today I'm making turkey meatloaf from a recipe I saw on The Barefoot Contessa. I'm using half white and half dark meat turkey, which I hope will work, because ground white meat turkey is usually very boring. This recipe adds a lot of stuff, which should help the flavor--sauteed onions, thyme, worcestershire sauce, and chicken stock. I've already done the mixing. At first I thought that there was way too much liquid, but after a little while the meat absorbed it all. I'll add a note later to say how it comes out. With that, I'll be making Provencal Tomatoes, from a recipe on the same show--tomatoes stuffed with breadcrumbs, herbs, and garlic, and baked--and mashed potatoes.

Edited to add: the turkey meatloaf was very tasty indeed, as were the tomatoes. Oh, and I forgot to mention the pluot-blackberry cobbler I made earlier today. I overdid it a little bit on adding ginger to the filling, but I like ginger, so it's all good.