Week 9: Argentina

After Courtney drew week 9's selection, I received an e-mail from my mom saying "Don't cry--it's Argentina!" I certainly didn't cry--I was quite pleased with the selection! Although I was a bit disappointed with the first experience I had with Argentinian culture (seeing Evita on stage last fall), I was quite pleased to delve into Argentinian cuisine. It's a unique cuisine in that not only does it hold true to its regional characteristics (South American styles), but it also has a very strong tie to its European connection.

Courtney jumped in and researched recipes for Argentina and came up with some great options right off the bat. We knew that we had to try the Argentinian staple chimichurri sauce, so in addition to that Courtney found recipes for side items - Receta por Berenjenas en Escabeche (an eggplant side dish) and Ensalada Rusa, a European-inspired potato salad. She also found a recipe for empanadas that she really wanted us to try (a margherita version, which emphasized the Italian flavors of mozzerella cheese, fresh tomato and basil), but mom and I talked her out of it since we weren't quite convinced of its authenticity as well as the fact that we just had the Russian counterpart the week before. The menu we agreed upon was quite delicious though (I also told Courtney we could try the empanada recipe she found another time--don't let me forget!).

Chimichurri sauce

The menu we decided upon was Costillas Con Chimichurri, Receta por Berenjenas en Escabeche and Ensalada Rusa. Costillas con chimichurri (literally "ribs with chimichurri") I somewhat cheated with--instead of short ribs, I opted for top round steak. The berenjenas en escabeche (eggplant in brine) was a recipe we insisted upon since we've had an eggplant in our refrigerator since Japan week that had to be used! The ensalada rusa (Russian Salad) was an interesting find and tie-in to the previous week's fare and according to Courtney's research is hugely popular in everyday Argentinian fare. All of the ingredients were readily available at the local grocery store, so it's a very accessible menu for all who'd like to try it. Courtney found all of the recipes from From Argentna with Love, a food blog dedicated to Argentinian food. The one menu item we wanted to include but had a difficult time finding was mate tea, but the meal was quite satisfactory without it.

Peas and carrots for Ensalada Rusa

The chimichurri sauce was very flavorful and easy to prepare--while I used dried parsley and curled-leaf parsley, the flavors were still distinct and delicious! The most difficult part was chopping the herbs to the right size, which was not too difficult at all. The ensalada rusa was also very easy, as well--we simply had to boil the potatoes and the carrots and peas and mixed them with the dressing (in which we substituted sour cream for mayo--which we somehow were out of at the house--but the sour cream ended up working very well). The eggplant (berenjenas en escabeche) took the most work of the three dishes--first it had to sit in salt for an hour or so, and then simmered in water and vinegar. I actually ruined the eggplant by letting it simmer at too high of a temperature and causing all of the vinegar to be absorbed very quickly which resulted in a highly-vinegary eggplant concoction--I would STRONGLY advise anyone interested in the eggplant recipe to keep a close eye on it while it cooks and to simmer at a fairly low heat.

Simmering eggplant

The chimichurri sauce was a big hit--I enjoyed it more than the meat itself, actually--I would definitely recommend preparing the beef short ribs to have with it rather than the top round steak. The ensalada rusa was also a great hit--the potato and pea and carrot salad is a recipe I certainly plan on bringing to a church potluck in the future! As I mentioned before, the eggplant (berenjenas en escabeche) was an unfortunate victim to my hasty cooking, but the pickled eggplant recipe looked promising and I'd like to try it again. Overall, I would recommend this menu to you all--especially the chimichurri and the ensalada rusa--both would be exotic yet simple additions to your family's weekly dinner menu.

The completed meal

Week 10's selection, the Australian Outback, is coming up next--and no, we're not having "shrimp on the barbie"! Check back in soon to find out about our next stop on our adventure around the world!

Week 7: Japan

For week 7, mom asked me if I wanted to draw--with a bit of nervous excitement, I drew, and let the whole family know exactly how I felt: "oh no--not Japan!" Not that there's anything wrong with Japan--not in the least--but for me there's just that something about Asian food that's so mysterious and unknown (and that I automatically associate with strong fish/seafood flavors) that leaves me reeling. The rest of my family seemed cool with the idea of Japan, though.

This week's menu was all researched by Courtney, and decided by all of us that the week should feature either tofu or (as I have feared) seafood. I'll admit that the thought of tofu vs. seafood was not too comforting to me, but I was bound and determined to try whatever we chose with an open mind. The selections that made up our menu were all chosen from a website Courtney found that documented authentic Japanese recipes and cuisine (bento.com). Our dishes were Aromatic Baked Salmon, Ochazuke and edamame with cherries. About half of this menu employed everyday foods for our family, and the other half was more exotic--actually, it may be more like 1/3 everyday ingredients and 2/3 exotic. The salmon dish had several special ingredients, including the main ingredient (salmon--a rare protein choice for our family), sake, mirin and yuzu. While we couldn't find the yuzu (we simply substituted with other citrus), we were able to find salmon and sake and I made my own mirin. The ochazuke was a fairly simple recipe that could be "jazzed-up" with each person's particular favorite flavors--at it's heart, ochazuke is white rice with green tea served over it and then topped with any of a various array of toppings. The edamame with cherries, as you might assume, was a pretty straight-forward recipe--although we don't usually have edamame or cherries in the house, they were easy to find at our local Harris Teeter (and while I found rice vinegar, I opted against spending the $6 for a bottle I might only use once and instead used good 'ole fashioned white vinegar).

Soy Sauce and Soybeans (mistakenly attributed as edamame!)

While discussing my family's plans for Japan week, my friend Brandi mentioned that Japanese food focuses on purity of flavors and that foods are not overly cooked or seasoned--I found that to be true with the prep and cooking processes for this meal. The fish rested for a few hours in a soy sauce/sake/mirin marinade and then simply baked in the oven for a short time. The rice was very easy--as simple as putting rice in the rice cooker and brewing a pot of green tea (which we all know I have quite the "stash" [you tea nerds will get the joke]). The edamame dish was also simple--all that we had to do was blend some of the beans with oil, vinegar and cherries and then mix in with the rest of the beans after they're heated through (in this case, I used dried cherries which I re-hydrated in cranberry juice the night before). The process for preparing this meal, albeit composed of several steps, was not at all complicated and was quite easy to follow.

Salmon in its marinade

As far as the end result--well, let's just say I had the right feeling when I drew Japan out of the hat in the first place! I was not much of a fan of the meal as a whole, personally. The salmon had a strong fishy taste (which, if that's what you like, is great--it's not my thing, however), but the flavor of the marinade was quite nice. The ochazuke didn't translate very well for me, either--I love rice and I love tea so I truly thought it was going to be a home-run success, but I wasn't a big fan; although had we used more of the traditional toppings like rice crackers or dried fish flakes (we opted for saltines [BAD IDEA! LOL] and fresh ginger [which I think overpowered the dish, actually]), we may have had a different opinion. I'd really like to give the edamame with cherries another chance--I actually purchased the wrong kind of beans for the recipe ("soy beans" in a can rather than straight-up edamame [another BAD IDEA! ha!]) which had a flavor very different than that of edamame (mom said the soy beans had a flavor similar to black eyed peas, which I don't care for much either). Overall, I would say that we learned a lot from the Japan meal experience--while I'd more than likely not prepare the salmon again, I might try it again with a less "fishy" fish and take another stab at both the ochazuke and the edamame with cherries. As shocking as it is for me to say, though, I think my favorite parts of the meal were (not-so-surprisingly) the cherries and the sake! The sake is a bit strong, but I truly like the flavor of it!

Sake

Thank you for bearing with me with my late blogging--I've been a bit busy these last few weeks, but it's truly important to me to share these ATWin52 experiences with you all! Coming up tomorrow (since I'm in catch-up mode) will be the blog on week 8's country--Russia! Although there was no vodka involved, we still had a great Russian meal experience--check back soon to find out about it!

Week 5: Thailand

This week, we ventured to Asia for the first time during ATWin52 while trying the flavors of Thailand. We followed the normal protocol of drawing a country out of the hat (rather than just picking a country without drawing as we did with Scotland last week). Thailand is one of those countries whose food I was anxious to try--it's a cuisine I've had some familiarity with (mostly through satay and through the assumption that it couldn't be much different from Chinese), but also a cuisine that offered a wide array of brand new flavors. My research of their cuisine quickly showed me the unique qualities of Thai food/culture, such as the beautiful characters in their written language, as well as the language itself which, while obviously Asian, translated into unique English phrases. The unique style of food preparation and ingredients also stuck out to me--Thai cuisine (what I've observed of it) is made up of many soups and rice noodle dishes (such as pad thai) with fresh ingredients including a variety of fruits and vegetables, herbs and spices, peanuts and lots of fish sauce; their cuisine is quite fresh and refreshing in preparation and ingredients.

After sifting through many Thai recipes, we opted for an American spin on two authentic Thai recipes. The "spin" was the classic combo of "soup and salad"; not that the two aren't eaten together in Thailand, but we thought it would be a nice change of pace from other cooking methods we've been using so far (yes, for those of you keeping score, we have had a soup--and a stew--already, but still ;-D ). Many Thai recipes are stir-fry in nature and recommend a wok for preparation (which we don't have), so that factor also played into our choices. Of the multitudes of Thai soups and salads to choose from, we opted for Tom Ka Gai and Som Tam. Tom Ka Gai is a spicy chicken soup with coconut milk (yes, this is the second instance of using coconut milk, but we thought it was okay since it's such a different interpretation than pollo con leche de coco) and Som Tam is a salad made with bean sprouts and papaya.

Thai Chilies, Baby Corn (which we DID NOT use) and Rice Noodles

The recipes we chose for the Tom Ka Gai and Som Tam both called for a few ingredients that we didn't have, so we either substituted or simply left out such ingredients as fish sauce, shrimp paste and basil leaves. The som tam called for a green papaya, but we settled for a regular ripe one. That being said, we might not have had the exact flavor experience as those in Thailand do, but we at least got a better idea of what the Thai people like to eat ;-D

Tom Ka Gai

The tom ka gai starts off with sautéing the garlic, ginger, lemongrass (a stalk-shaped herb that has a strong lemon scent) chilies and spices--the fumes from that mixture while cooking were intense! After sautéing the herbs and spices, we added chicken and onions and let them cook through; the next step was adding the water, coconut milk and soy sauce (instead of fish sauce) and letting it simmer for half an hour (note: while the recipe calls for a lot of fish sauce/soy sauce, it's not at all overpowering--if you're concerned about sodium content, consider using a reduced-sodium soy sauce variety). Truly the most difficult step of preparing the soup was chopping up the herbs/vegetables--quite the simple soup! I also cooked some rice noodles to eat with the soup, which I prepared separately by the advice of another tom ka gai recipe. To serve, I put noodles in bowls and then ladled soup over them. The salad was also easy to prepare, with the most difficult/time-consuming steps being cutting up the fruit and vegetables and preparing the simple dressing (oil/soy sauce [fish sauce/shrimp paste]/lime juice). While the recipes required a lot of prep work, the difficultly level/cooking times were not much at all.

Som Tam

Although Rick did not partake in this meal, those of us who did (me, mom and Courtney) absolutely LOVED it! Mom and I actually craved more salt for the soup in spite of the large amount of soy sauce in the recipe, but the flavor of the soup was great--a bit spicy but creamy from the coconut milk. The bok choy gave a slight taste of cabbage, but not to an overpowering extent (considering Courtney enjoyed the soup and does NOT enjoy cabbage). The salad was quite refreshing and was excellent with a sprinkling of crushed peanuts on top. I can definitely foresee this meal being made again and I'll be glad to have it (and share it with you, if you'd like!).

We've drawn for Week 6 tonight--we're going to Africa--Zimbabwe to be exact! I think we've already got some ideas for what we're making, and it's going to be very fun (and perhaps the most authentic experience so far)--who wants in?

Week 2: Greece

This past week, we chose Greece as our country of the week. We again breathed a sigh of relief--yet another country that was somewhat of a not-too-different country for us to try.

I was pretty stoked that we drew Greece--I even have a recipe book strictly devoted to Greek food (that Meredith gave me--thanks!!), so I immediately consulted it:

Although there were some great recipes in there, most of them were a bit too out there (i.e. exotic or authentic) for the whole family to be willing to try. While I was searching my book, mom was Googling recipes and found some more strong contenders. Most of mom's finds, however, left me scared stiff--they were mostly seafood. Seafood is something I've never cooked before (except for Gorton's frozen fish from the box); what made me most apprehensive, though, was the type of seafood dishes she was finding: fish stews. Although I'm all about the ATWin52 project widening our horizons and stretching our tastes, I desperately pleaded that we not have a fish stew--something about the idea just did not sit well with me--I kept thinking that fishy fish cooked in broth = fishy fish and fishy broth--I just wasn't quite at the point of embarking on that adventure! So mom made the suggestion that if we're having Greek food, our protein needed to be seafood or lamb (like seafood NOT cooked in stew); although the roasted/grilled seafood idea was appealing, I opted for lamb. Albeit I am not a huge fan of lamb either, but I was very willing to make the sacrifice so as to avoid the seafood stew. 

The one lamb dish inspiration I got from the book was "Oven-baked Arni," which was basically roasted leg of lamb. We concurred that plain-old roasted leg of lamb was a bit too ordinary (not to mention expensive!), so we continued to Google around for lamb recipes. What we decided on was Arni me Fassolakia (αρνί με φασολάκια if you'd like to get technical), literally "lamb with beans." Like last week, what I ended up cooking was a mix of two recipes (Recipe #1 | Recipe #2). Arni me Fassolakia is really a fairly simple recipe--a lamb stew with potatoes, tomatoes and green beans. Acquiring the lamb for the meal was quite the adventure (including my car giving out at the Lowe's Foods), but after going from place-to-place to find reasonably priced lamb and getting the meat off the bones, the rest of the meal was a breeze. What made it special was the lamb and the seasonings (parsley, mint, dill and cinnamon).

The Arni me Fassolakia simmering away

Overall, the family liked the Arni; it's a feat in and of itself when we can find something new that the whole family will enjoy! The first bit of feedback I received from Rick was "is there peanut butter in this?" to which I aptly replied "umm...no!" He noticed the sweetness of the cinnamon and after I pointed that ingredient out to him, I think he got it. Mom didn't love the flavor of cinnamon mixed in with the savory ingredients, but she finished her meal along with Rick (score!). Rick commented that he wished the stew "had a kick to it" (a spicy kick, that is). Courtney seemed to enjoy it as well; I personally thought it needed a bit more of the herbs than the recipe(s) called for, as well as more tomatoes and salt (I always want more tomatoes and salt, so that might not be a fair comment!). This is definitely a recipe I'd be willing to try again!

The finished product

Thanks to everyone who's been keeping up with the blog and making some great suggestions on Facebook (and props to Courtney for the great photos!)! Although we didn't have any spanikopita or galaktoboureko (or "galactic burrito" as Olga dubbed it), we may be able to sneak those in next time! Keep the suggestions coming--although we may not plug them in right away (since we're trying to avoid foods we've already experienced), we'll definitely keep them in mind to try in the future! And, as always, if there's a country you'd like to join with us in experiencing, just let me know and we'd be happy to share the experience--at the table--with you!

Stay tuned--this week's country is being drawn later this afternoon!

First Things First

This year, my family is going "Around the World in 52 Meals"; in other words, once a week we'll be preparing (or, in some instances, purchasing) meals from countries around the world. Today, we sat down and made a list of countries to choose from--think we've got a pretty good list!

 Here it is all typed out:

North America USA Canada Mexico Caribbean Polynesia Jamaica

Australia Outback Mainland Oceania

South America Nicaragua Argentina Brazil Suriname/Guyana Cuba Venezuela Colombia Panama Bolivia Chile

Africa South Africa Morocco Egypt Senegal Tanzania Congo Zimbabwe Swaziland Nigeria Sudan Chad

Asia Turkey Russia Nepal Hong Kong Philippines Japan China Thailand India Israel Saudi Arabia Afghanistan

Europe Ireland Scotland France England Switzerland Germany Greece Italy Spain Czech Republic/Slovakia

So how it'll work is that we'll draw a country name from the hat (well, actually a plastic container) at the beginning of the week and after drawing, I (or in some cases someone else in the family) will find a recipe from the country and prepare it later on in the week. If we happen to draw countries from the same continent two weeks in a row, we'll put it back and draw another. There'll be a few exceptions to drawing names (like making Scottish food like vegetarian haggis on Robbie Burns Day), but most weeks we'll stick to the plan. I'll post photos of the food and a link to the recipe and let you know what we thought about that country's cuisine. While it's true that you cannot judge a country's cuisine by one dish, I firmly believe that this project will give us more cultural insight as well as stretch our palettes!

As much as I'd like to claim the idea as my own, I suggested we adopt the idea from a contestant on Jeopardy some time a few months ago. While the contestant is now going across the country by cooking foods from state-to-state, I think it will be quite enough of an adventure with the list we have.


I look forward to hearing your input and would love to see suggestions for recipes if you already have favorites from our list of countries! (And also, give me a heads up if you want to be a part of any of these meals--maybe we can make a party of it!)


Here's to a fun and exciting trip!