Today it is 88 degrees and sunny. Very hot for the Bay Area, so no stoves today. This week is all about cool, quick dinners. We may even eat outside! Here's what's cooking this week.

Meatless Monday
Na-omi-take tofu. Temperature in the 90s in the Bay Area means no stove. A cool meal for this temporary blast of summer. We may even be in the pool today.

Tuesday
Chicken Tikka Masala. Trying out Safeway's brand of starter sauce as the Seeds of Change brand can be harder to find.

Meatless Wednesday
Simple Spaghetti and a simple salad. A Feeding My Ohana Like-er recommends adding slivered almonds to salad. Genius! I'll probably toss in some dried cranberries as well. Pasta and salad is one of the best weekday dinners.

Fish on Thursday
Stuffed Tuna Melts. Again, minimal cooking.

Plate Lunch Friday
Bulgogi, Wonbok coleslaw and rice. Short ribs cook really fast and with more daylight, Friday night grilling is on!

New recipe posted
My Daddy's Aburage Thingy
The first time I made this, it was a little too much everything--sweet, salty, liquid-ey. Not Feeding My Ohana-worthy. However, I fixed all the above-noted troubles. It is now family-approved.

Working on a couple of new recipes this week. Stay tuned for mid-week posts!

What are YOU cooking this week?

With apologies to Midwest and East Coasters, who should kick the tar out of Punxsutawney Phil and his entourage for incorrectly predicting an early spring, we are going with warmer weather dinners this week. 

Meatless Monday
Summer Soba Salad. Something quick and light for a piano lesson and soccer practice evening.

Processed Meat Tuesday
Spam and String Beans. I grew up in Hawaii and make no apologies for Spam. However, I do draw the line at Vienna sausages. Blech!

Meatless Wednesday
From Scratch Falafel. I shape them more like a hash pattie so I don't have to deep fry. 

Experimental Thursday
Thai Chicken Pizza Take 1. Aiming for the CPK Thai chicken pizza, but adding more veggies--bean sprouts, carrots and red peppers. Plus a little more zing with lime juice. We shall see.

Good Friday Fish
Shoyu Fish Sandwiches and Spicy Asian Coleslaw. 

The pasta with soy-rizo worked out well last week. No photos, but will post the recipe later this week. 

Hang in there with the last bit of cold. Spring is on the way! 

It takes about two weeks to get rid of all the sand and to lose da pidgin. Perpetuating the relaxing vibe will have to be done by photos and plate lunch dinners. The husband has been cooking more and added a couple too.

Experimental Monday
Spice Packet Indian Food. While we have successfully taken pre-packaged taco, enchilada, Sloppy Joes, spaghetti sauce and gravy spice packets from the pantry, the husband decided to try Gobi Aloo and Curry Vindaloo packets.  Just add water and vegetables! Gluten free! Ready in 15 minutes! All of that was true, and there were no leftovers, but not in a good way. We do not recommend pre-packaged spice packets.

Tried and True Tuesday
Teriyaki Chicken, musubi and chicken-less Chinese Chicken Salad. Plate lunch dinner. Aaah, the Rainbow's vibe

Meatless Wednesday
Butternut squash soup, made by the husband because he wants to try out the new hand mixer. I also hear that there's a good dollop of pistachios and heavy cream, so I'm sure this is going to be good.

Thursday
Pork Adobo Fried Rice. Our homage to Elena's.

Fish on Friday
Misoyaki Butterfish, if I can find butterfish, otherwise, it's Omi's Shoyu Fish and Homestyle Mac Salad. These have been out rotation for awhile and requested by the children.

Leaving home. Welcome home. What is your favorite plate lunch?

We seem to be a society of busy--where multitasking is standard operating procedure for improved efficiency. 

Hmmm...methinks that is corporate malarkey. Today, I purposefully did NOT multitask. I made a write-it-down-on-paper-God-honest list of work items and household tasks, which included this post. I turned OFF Facebook, Twitter, Skype and my email, and just concentrated on the task (singular) at hand.

Full Disclosure: I had a conference call via Skype and had to turn that on, but did not email, check Facebook, or do other things during the call. 

The work got done, and it took less time than I thought. I went food shopping for the week, armed with another list, of course. I went running. And we had full and proper family dinner. The rest of the week is looking good too.

Not-Multitasking Monday
Orange Salsa Pork Chops, green beans, Chinese chicken-less salad and rice. Yep, made it in an hour.

Tuesday
Teriyaki Salmon, musubi and the rest of the Chinese chicken-less salad. Definitely less than an hour.

Wednesday
Shrimp-less Sausage Jambalaya. I will use chicken Andouille sausage and make a double batch. Shrimp doesn't freeze very well, and this is why it will be shrimp-less.

Thursday
Loaded tuna melts. Sandwich as dinner, perhaps with Kale Chips or Parmesan Edamame from Pinterest. I might opt for the lazy version of panini: toaster + microwave.

Meatless Friday
Korean Mushroom Tofu and eggs scrambled with kimchee and green onions, based on a post from from Sandra's Easy Cooking. Because one block of tofu is not quite enough for the sky-high metabolism of the teenagers. Add Korean-style bean sprouts and purple rice to the party for another full and proper family dinner made less than an hour.

I'm not sure I'll be able to maintain the serial-process living, but it was less stressful than the here-and-there flitting about that is usually Multitasking Monday. What works for you?

Eat Well. Be Well.

The whole gestalt of dinner is essential to me. We sit down at a dinner table that is not in front of our TV and eat together at least 3-4 times a week, the way I did as a kid in Hawaii. Main protein, rice, some vegetable, and time and mindshare for the family. Nourishing indeed.

Sometimes this is easy. Sometimes it requires takeout. The "at the dinner table" part will start to happen a little less often now that hockey is finally back. 

But sometimes you can make "Wow! This is like Korean food in Hawaii" kind of dinners. Fish Jun with Kochojang Sauce is just such a meal. It can be made from scratch in less than an hour. As noted before, the marinade and process are very similar to Korean Egg Meat, but it is much faster.

As a bonus, the kochojang dipping sauce is awesome with Kale Chips, green beans or scrambled eggs. You can buy kochojang sauce at Korean grocery stores. Store it in the fridge like miso.

Click here to make this your next weekday dinner. 

Experiments 1 and 2 from last week went pretty well. 

Tofu with Snap Peas and Mushrooms and Pretty Much My Mother-in-Law's Corn Chowder were both unanimously approved.

Greek Tuna Pasta Salad and the Tomato Tart also worked out pretty well, and I'll post those later this week.

And then...there was...paint. When I posted the mystery item to FB and Twitter, guesses ranged from:

Tomato bisque
Carrot ginger soup
Persimmon sauce
Red pepper-something
Campbell's tomato soup
Braised essence of tangerine goop
and my favorite, from my cousin (of course) paint!

It was supposed to be a citrus glaze for chicken, but nothing was even remotely workable--taste, smell, color. It got scrapped and I made a stir-fry style Sweet and Sour Chicken instead.

This week, I've manage to meatless twice again. And to give my poor family a break, just one experiment.

Meatless Monday
Simple Tomato Spaghetti Sauce. It was a very hard Monday, so I needed something simple and sustaining.

Fishy Tuesday
Fish Jun with kochojang dipping sauce. So much quicker and lighter than the traditional meat jun. Will also try to post this one too.

Wednesday
Chicken Marsala, an old favorite.

Experimental Thursday
Baked kabocha, stuffed with with Homemade Pork Sausage, cubed asiago cheese bread (from Safeway) and onions, an experiment from my boss. He made this for Thanksgiving and I've been meaning to try it.

Meatless Friday
Mom's Miso Soup with green onions and egg dropped in. Plus rice and kim chee. Again, simple sustenance for a long week.

This particularly difficult and hectic Monday that has given me pause to be extremely grateful for my ohana. Appreciate every minute with yours.

What's good about winter rain in California? Lots of green. As in lettuce, choy greens, mizuna, spinach and arugula. I have already consulted with the household carnivore, and as a bonus, we are meatless twice this week. Here's how we are going green this week.

Monday
Myles Last Resort Meatloaf, salad and cheese buns from the Cheese Board Collective on Shattuck Avenue, Berkeley. After the tofu-loaf fiasco, it's time for reliable, 'normal' meatloaf. The ironic thing is that the ingredients for the good loaf and the very bad loaf are quite similar. Leaf of the day: romaine lettuce for salad.

Tuesday
Portuguese Sausage Sticky Rice and Choy Sum with Shoyu-Mirin Sauce. Leaves of the day: baby spinach in the sticky rice and choy sum, in the choy sum.

Meatless Wednesday
Shabu-shabu. Leaf of the day: mizuna, a Japanese green.

Thursday
Cornmeal Fish. Leaf of the day: the rest of Tuesday's spinach sauteed with a bit of garlic.

Meatless Friday
Macadamia-Arugula Pasta. Well-worth the trip to Trader Joe's for the lemon pepper pappardelle. Leaf of the day: arugula! Swap in pine nuts if you're out of macs.

Stay dry this week. Eat Well. Be Well.

These two Japanese/Hawaii foods maximize the effort-to-taste/presentation value ratio. Amazingly easy to do.

Seared Furikake Ahi

Bet your friends, "$20 says I can make restaurant-worthy cuisine in 5 minutes flat." Then back it up with Seared Furikake Ahi.
Heating the pan is what takes longest so here's how to pace:

0-1.5 minutes
Immediately start to heat pan. Unwrap ahi, rub with canola or ideally macadamia nut oil and press furikake on all sides of the ahi.

1.5-3 minutes
Test pan for appropriate heat. Pan should be very sizzling hot. Sear ahi 5-15 seconds on all 6 sides

3-4.5 minutes
Let it sit for about 30 seconds. Slice thinly and plate.

4.5-5 minutes
Collect on the bet and bask in your cooking awesomeness.

Homemade Pickled Shoga (Ginger)

Shoga, Japanese for ginger, is that lovely pink sweet/sour paper- thin zingy ginger that accompanies sushi. 

My mother-in-law let me in on just how easy this is. This might take all of 10 minutes to do. However, if you can, it's best to allow the shoga to sit for 10 additional minutes to absorb flavor and color.

Click here for Seared Furikake Ahi.

Click here for Homemade Pickled Shoga.

Eat Well. Be Well. 

Today's game was No-Wallet Monday. I left my wallet in my car. Not usually a big deal, except that today my husband is driving said wallet-containing car, and I barely ever have cash on-hand. So with $20 dollars scrounged up from around the house, the challenge was to get enough for Monday's dinner.

Here's what happened on Monday and what's cooking for the rest of the week.

No-Wallet Monday
Fed the ohana for $11, plus char siu and edamame from the household 'freezer pantry'.
Pillsbury Manapua and an Edamame Salad that deserves a second look, using yuzu from a friend's yard. Bought the following: 2 tins of Pillsbury biscuits, 2 bunches of green onions, a bag of shredded carrots, 1 bunch of fresh mint, plus a cake of tofu for $11! Everyone is happy and full.

Tuesday
Should be a normal weekly shopping trip now that I've retrieved the wallet. Chicken Divan, at the request of the teenagers. 

Fishy Wednesday
Mahi-mahi with tomato butter sauce. It's time to get this out of the Greenhouse and into a regular rotation. It's too good, too close and too easy not to finalize it.

Meatless Thursday
PDQ Hot and Sour Soup. Skipping the pork and using only the tofu from the $11 purchase on Monday.

Friday
Mediterranean Lamb Stir Fry. We had takeout Caribbean food this weekend and tried curried goat. I may try to use goat instead of lamb, as it is the more locally raised animal, but we shall see.

Eat Well. Be Well. 
Be grateful for those who defend our country.

What a crazy natural disaster few days. The tsunami alert for my Feeding My Ohana-ohana in Hawaii has passed. To our Feeding My Ohana-ohana on the Northeast, stay safe and dry.

Sandy looks like a bad one, so please take care! 

Make sure you have lots of water, canned goods like tomato sauce, black beans and tuna, bread, peanut butter, batteries, band aids and gas for your cars and grill.　Out west, here's what's cooking.

Monday
Korean Egg Meat, using fish. I LOVE egg meat, but since my son doesn't eat cow, I'm using Dover sole. Fish jun is standard for Korean restaurants in Hawaii, so I think it should work, and cooking will be much faster than beef.

A proper Monday meal with musubi, kim chee, kale chips and a new kochojang dipping sauce. 

Liking the sound of this already!

Meatless Tuesday
Sweet potato curry. This seems like a very fall kind of dish.

Wednesday--Happy Halloween!
Kamaboko Sandwiches. A childhood favorite of mine that I'm foisting upon my children. They can decide if it's a trick or treat. Not nearly as strange as the kimchee/peanut butter or sardine/onion sandwiches I've also liked and eaten as a kid.

Thursday
Christine's Clam Chowder. Feeding My Ohana's Virtual Food Drive kick-off day. We will be matching donations again this year.

Friday
Seared Furikake Ahi Salad. Something new and light to go with Halloween candy.


Extras from the bakery
Butterscotch pumpkin bread
Banana-Nutella bread, from last month's issue of Cooking Light

Eat Well. Be Well. Stay Safe!!