July Kulinarya - Pang-Habang-Buhay

No Carb Fajita aka Lettuce Wrap

Where did the week go?

I could swear it was just Monday.  Don’t get me wrong I love Fridays but I thought I had so much time to get things done.  It is Friday and guess what I got done - nothing.  Oh well, maybe next week.  There was one main reason – I have been putting all of my efforts and time to losing weight.   I came to realized the older I get, the harder for me to lose the weight.  Ohh aging.  I have always been in a constant war with my love of food and my weight.  I made a promise to myself that I will lose weight.  So I came to realization that if I didn’t get help to drop the added baby and husband weight, I won’t be able to drop the weight.

Grilled Pork Loin Over Vermicelli

Vietnamese Grilled Pork Loin Over Vermicelli

In my exploration of healthy eating, I decided to make some Vietnamese food.  Most of the dishes is made with fresh vegetables.  I am able to add or subtract anything I don't like.  We had some left over noodles, roasted pork loin, Romain lettuce, and cilantro from our adventure with Spring Rolls.  I just reused the ingredients into this meal.  My only effort was to make the Nuoc man (the fish dipping sauce) and re-grill the meat.  We didn't slice up all the meat when we made the Spring Rolls, especially since there was bone-in pieces.  The Husband sliced up the meat while I made the sauce.  We reheated the noodles and sliced up the lettuce.  There should be more vegetables but it was way too cold to go out (I love Chicago Winters...do you hear the sarcasm?  I hope you do). 

Ingredients for the Dish

Grilled sliced meat of choice (pork, beef, chicken, or shrimp)

            * the recipe for the marinate is on the Spring Roll Entry

A package of vermicelli noodles or desired amount (we only used 1/2 since there is only 2.5 of us eating - yes the baby is only 1/2 :D)

Shredded Roman Lettuce

Garnish *mint or cilantro (this is what we used)

Carrots Julianne style *I wish we had some

Sliced Cucumber *Again we ran out

Sliced Tomatoes *We ran out, we really need to go to the store

Directions

Once the marinated meat is sliced and grilled, set it aside.  We used a skillet but using a grill would be so much better.  Than again it was 10 degrees last night and we were not about to go outside.  *Sigh......wishful thinking of moving somewhere warm*  Sorry I'm back :D.  boil a pot of water and place the noodles once the water is boiling.  The noodles should be cooked within a couple of minutes.  Drain and place in a deep bowl or multiple bowls.  Place the shredded roman lettuce and the rest of the vegetables if you have them (again I wish we did).  Place pieces of the meat on top.  It will pretty much look like this:

 * It would have been better with more veggies...*shaking fist*... I hate snow!

On the side is the Nuoc mam cham sauce.  It was pretty simple to make.  I was actually surprised. 

Ingredients

1 Cup of Water

4 Tablespoons of Rice Vinegar

4 Tablespoons of Sugar

5 Tablespoons of Fish Sauce

1 Tablespoon of Garlic *finely chopped

2 Fresh small chili peppers *I can't handle spice stuff so I opted out on this ingredient.

Directions

Boil the water with the vinegar and sugar.  Once it comes to a boil, turn off the stove and allow it to cool.  Add the garlic, peppers, and the fish sauce.  That is it.  Simple huh?  

To eat 

Pour a little of the sauce into the bowl, mix well, and consume. 

This was my lunch too, it is still as good.  I still had a spring roll left, so myself and The Baby shared it. 

Spring Rolls

 Vietnamese Spring Rolls

* adapted from http://rasamalaysia.com/

I love Spring Rolls.  It is the just the mixture of meat with noodles and vegetables but the best part is the wrapping.  For some reason, I love the texture of it.  It is much different from the traditional Lumpia Shanghai I'm used to.  It is soft and a little chewy.  I love how fresh the vegetables.  Traditionally this is made with shrimp and pork loin but The Husband hates shrimp so I'm out of luck.  I even made a vegetarian version and it was still as good. 

Ingredients

For the Pork slices

1 lb Pork chops, loin, butt or shoulder, sliced thin.  I used pork loin it provided a nice balance of fat to meat.

        *I might try other meats if The Husband lets me

2 Garlic Cloves, minced

2 Shallots, minced

1 Tbs Fish sauce * we could use due to The Baby's allergies.  I'm in search of a vegetarian version.

1 Tsp of Sugar

2 Tsp of Black Pepper or to Taste

1/2 Cup of Vegetable or Peanut Oil *again The Baby has allergies so we went with Vegetable Oil

Needed for assembly

Hoisin Peanut Sauce *Again with our allergic munchkin we got stuck with just Hoisin Sauce

Rice paper

Roman Lettuce

Cucumber, julianne style

Fresh herbs: Mint, cilantro, basil, or any thing you like *we used Cilantro

Bean Sprouts * we didn't have any

Directions

Mix all the ingredients for the pork slices.  Let it sit for 20 minutes.  Grill the pieces for about 2-3 minutes depending on your preference. 

To assemble

Soak the rice paper in warm water for 3-5 secs until it is flexable but do not over soak or it will break.  Place on work surface, for me it was a plate.  Place the lettuce first on the wrapping toward the end by you, then place the meat, then the rest of the vegetables.  Roll the spring roll.  View this video to see how Roll a spring roll.  And than consume. 

Here is the directions on making the Hoisin Peanut Sauce

Ingredients

1 Cup or 8 oz of hoisen sauce

1/4 Cup of Smooth Peanut Butter

1 Tbs of Rice Vinegar

2 Cloves of Garlic, crushed

1 Minced of Thai chili

Directions

Just blend well

* Again pretty easy

 

Healthy Eating Continues

I meant to post this last week when I actually made the dish but I got suck into school and work.  Ok, I actually got obsessed with perfecting my Pan De sal.  So I had left over portabella mushrooms from the meal day prior.  Instead we just did a simple pasta with all vegetables.  The Husband actually like it, I was quite surprised.  The Baby preferred the pasta.

Instead of using a heavy sauce, we just used olive oil and just seasoned the veggies.  We used a red pepper, the mushrooms, garlic of course, onions, and we had some artichoke hearts.  We barely used any salt and just used Italian seasons and a little cheese.  It came out quite well.  Hopefully, this continues.  Not sure about that one through :D  Back to Meal Planning. 

Healthy Eating Starts

Healthy eating

 

As part of my new years resolutions, I wanted to incorporate healthier meals into our daily lives.  We generally eat a lot of meat and rice at dinner and I'm trying to expand our palate with quite a bit of protest from The Husband.  Since he is too lazy to cook, he is stuck with my decisions....sucka!  Anyway, last night I made a whole vegitarian meal.  It came out pretty well but I think I cook a little too much for the three of us.  I'm too used to cooking for 5 people when the Brother and Cuz stayed with us.  First I made sauteed Portabella mushrooms to replace our meat intake.  Than I made cucumber salad and than a vegitarian sushi.  BTW, if we had sushi rice it would have been better but we used what we had. 

I apologize for the pictures.  My SRL is not working so I was stuck with my point and shoot.  Unfortunately, I am not able to get the images I wanted to take. 

Cucumber Salad

Ingredients

Sugar

Vinegar

Sliced up Cucumbers

Directions

It is up to your taste how much vinagar and sugar to use.  I tend to make it a bit sweeter so I used a whole cup to 2 cups of vinegar.  If you like it more tangy, use less sugar.  Just mixed the sugar and vinegar together until it is fully incorporated and than add the cucumbers.  Make sure it sits for a couple of minutes so the vinegar mixture gets soaked into the cucumbers.

I just grilled the mushrooms on a skillet with salt and pepper to tasted and than added fresh garlic ontop.  I have read quite a bit of articles on the benefit of fresh garlic.  It does need to be chopped up to activate the antioxidants.  I watch way too much random shows on our direct TV. 

Vegitarian Sushi

Ingredients

 3 cups of cooked rice *btw The Husband just make 2 cups so the there was little too much liquid.  We know for next time!

2/3 cups of vinegar

6 tbs of brown sugar

* If you have sushi rice, you don't need these ingredients.

Any vegitable you would like, we used avacado and cucumber

Cream Cheese *this is not always needed depending on what you like.

Sheets of Nori

Directions

Mix the vinegar and sugar until it is fully desolved.  Mix in the cooked rice until it is fully incorporated.  Again this step is not needed if you have sushi rice.  Slice up the vegitable julienne style (*side note, I suck at cutting the vegitables like this so we have uneven size sushi.  The Husband laughed at me when I was doing it).  Spread out the rice on a sheet of nori and than place the vegitables and cream cheese toward the edge of the bed of rice.  Start rolling the end up.  Make sure it is tightly rolled or it will fall out much to The Husband's annoyance.  Than again he gets annoyed quite often :D.

Through The Husband did whine about no meat in our dinner, we are quite satified and could barely finish our food.  So guess what I have to lunch...yes you named it, left overs :D 

I did kinda ruin the healthy meal by having a mango, graham cracker type dessert.  It was suppose to be like a tarimisu but I got the wrong type of cream.  I wasn't sure what Purpose cream was until recently.  So it was really just a mixture of cream, mangos, and graham crackers.  it is not the healthiest choice but I give myself points for the mango :D. 

 

Hopefully I keep this going without The Husband going on strike.