Hello people! Yup, it’s been a while. Anything happened since my last post? Oh boy. Needless to say, things have shifted a bit in the outside world as well as on the family front with the Ting fam. More on this later perhaps in a future post – maybe three years from now, given my current track record with this blog. But the main thing is holy shit! The kids are growing so fast! My wife constantly reminds me to do more of these videos while the kids are still (kind of) cute and I’m always like ” yeah, yeah, yeah…” But then Mona my now 7-year old(!) was like, “Baba, can we make a food video?” And I was like ” yeah, yeah yeah…” But here’s the thing: Mona is very persistent and her constant asks and reminders turned my “yeah, yeah, yeah” into an “Ok, fine! What should we make?” We went through the list of things I like to cook and what the family likes to eat. A lot of the dishes we’ve already done for this blog (please peruse after consuming this post) and other dishes seemed needlessly complicated in terms of actually cooking and actually filming. You see, I’m going to break some news here. If it wasn’t absolutely obvious, I’m kind of – no totally – lazy and I just didn’t feel like making a huge effort (God, as I write this I’m realizing what a terrible parent I’ve become or have always been), so I decided to go with what was easiest. The “dish” we settled on was… you guessed it (because you’re a genius and or read the above title of the blog post): a smoothie!
For this one, I went with what we had in the freezer/ fridge, so I didn’t have to go grocery shopping. In this case it was:
Often, to make the smoothie “healthier” I’ll add kale but we didn’t have any. So here’s how we do it. Although honestly, if you need instructions on how to make a smoothie, well then you might need more help than I can offer you here. Really this video is for savoring that magical dynamic between two charismatic kids and their tired and jaded father. But don’t thank me, thank Mona. Please enjoy.
Hi all, I can’t believe it’s been over six months since my last post. Actually I can because that’s been my normal blog schedule more often then not, because you know, life). What I have a harder time believing is that here we are in December (the tail end of 2020) and we’re still in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic. If you’re remotely aware of current events, you’ll have some idea of why we’re still in this position, so I’m not going to get into it here and talk about how there’s been a total lack of national leadership in dealing with this pandemic, etc. What I will get into is how much I appreciate what I consider another one of the basics that any home cook should have in his/her/their repertoire: broth.
Why broth? Well, by making your own broth you can save money (always a positive in my book) AND thumb your nose at dumb ass foodie trends and bullshit marketing. I hope you weren’t reading that last sentence aloud at work, on zoom or with your kids present. I guess you can say I have some strong feelings when it comes to the way certain things in the food world become fads and crass commercialism kicks in. Case in point: “bone broth”. People have been making broth for as long as food scraps and bones have existed but it’s only been in the last few years with cross-fitand theketodiet gaining traction that you have the rise of bespoke, hipster, artisanal bone brothwhich will often run you anywhere from $5-$8 for a 16 oz. container. Listen, I get it. If you don’t have the time nor the bones to actually make it yourself, then by all means, go ahead and buy it. But, if you cook at home, eat meat and have time, then there’s really no excuse. You should make your own broth – not “bone broth” just broth. It’s so easy. All you need are bones that you will have saved from your meat, an oven and time to roast those bones, water and a pot and stove to boil those bones. That’s it. You can also add vegetables if you want. I usually, don’t because I use my broth as a base for other soups or I add it to sauces or gravies. Alright, here’s how I do it.
I’ll keep this short and sweet. We’ve been in lock down (shelter in place/ social distance mode) for at least a month and a half. So, I thought I would make videos of really simple things that I never really thought warranted videos. But given a lot of time to reflect – like, a lot of time during this pandemic – I realized that sometimes it’s the simple things that we take for granted. Case in point: yogurt. It’s probably the easiest thing to make provided you have milk, a yogurt starter (any plain yogurt should work provided it has live yogurt cultures), a way to keep it warm (110°F) and time (a few hours). People have beenmaking yogurtfor millenia, so it’s literally not rocket science, because rockets did not exist 5000 years ago. Unless aliens were actually the ones who… oh never mind. Check out the video for how I do it. As yogurt making is so simple and easy, it’s inherently calming, because you’re doing nothing but waiting. And so, inspired by my niece and her first foray into ASMR, I decided to try my hand at making a calm and soothing video. Let’s just say, at least the yogurt turned out. I’ll let you be the judge. Please watch with volume up or headphones for the full calming effect.
Let me just put this out there: I love leftovers like a fat kid loves cake! Shout out to 50 Cent. Now what I don’t love are global pandemics like COVID-19. However, as we are all trying our best toshelter in place in order to flatten the curve (it’s real, let’s all do our part), like others I find myself cooking a whole lot more out of necessity and also to keep sane. That means a whole lot more leftovers, which because I Iove them – as I mentioned at the top – is “a good thing”. Oh my God, I just quotedMartha Stewart! Fuck you, Coronavirus!
But sometimes, instead of the actual meal – like actual, say, lasagna leftovers – I’m left with just the extra flat sheets of egg pasta (homemade because the grocery stores were completely out of all pastas! #panicbuying #humblebrag) I used for the lasagna. What do I do then? Well, coincidentally, that theoretical was based on true life events. And I’ll tell you what I did. I cut that pasta up into noodles and found other ingredients in my fridge that went well with egg noodles: sausage, zucchini, garlic, lemon, capers. And then I threw it all together and made another delicious meal! Because that’s what I do: I make leftovers more delicious.
Fortunately for you, I also I made video with my 4 year-old iphoneSE (with a dirty front lens I can’t clean – thank you Apple!) and my 4 year-old daughter (with a mostly clean front face) because I’m kind of going crazy and just wanted to make something without thinking about it too much. So, give a watch and hopefully it inspires you to do something creative and delicious with your leftovers.
Hey DeliciousTings blog fans! I’m talking to you, Mom, sis, and that anonymous bot sending me spam comments (nope, I don’t need Jimmy Choo shoes or Cialis – or maybe..?) Anyway, have I got a treat for you today. Let’s start off by playing a little game. Here’s a list of items: a dining room table, several chairs, 80s style round stools, a tiny step stool with legs that look like crayons, a compact stereo receiver, a child’s scooter, 2 kids bikes, 2 adult mountain bikes, an Italian coffee maker, the seminal 70s era book “Free to Be You and Me”, a ping pong table. What do all of these things have in common? Well, along with a bunch of other items that I can’t recall, these are all things that I’ve found on the street and brought home! Oh my God, I just realized I’m hoarder. Oh well. Know thyself, am I right? But why exactly do these things give me so much unmitigated joy? 1) They’re free. 2) They’re still totally useful and they work! Anybody who knows me will tell you that yeah, I’m into value (some might even say “cheap” – I say “frugal”) AND I hate wasting things. If something can still be used, then I’m damn well going to use it and if they’re not quite useful, then I will MacGyver them until they are useful (I mean, within reason). So yeah, other peoples’ trash can very well be my treasure. I think I honed my scavenging ways when I was living in Brooklyn and needed to furnish my apartment – the first time I had my own place. People in Prospect Heights, where I was living at the time, would throw out really good stuff. Here’s an example. I was walking home at night on a block with a bunch of brownstones and happened upon this beautiful wooden dining room table, legs detached from the table top that somebody had put out. Score! The only thing was this table was heavy and there was no way I could haul it the three blocks back to my place. So, I hailed a taxi (this was before Uber and Lyft), loaded the table into the trunk and then used the remaining strength I had to haul that table up four flights of stairs to my apartment.
That unadulterated joy of finding cool and useful stuff on the street has stayed with me and now that we live back in the Bay, it’s something I’ve probably passed on to my kids as well. In fact, just the other week, as we were driving back from grocery shopping, Kaya spotted a kid’s mountain bike out on the curb, that somebody was giving away. It was perfectly fine except for a couple of flat tires. We brought it home, pumped up the tires and boom! Kaya’s got a bike with two hand brakes and gears. After her first sesh with the bike, I asked her, “Kaya, what do you think of your new bike?” “I LOVE it!” she gushed. True story.
So where am I going with all of this? What could this possibly have to do with a frozen nondairy dessert that is spelled with silent “t” (thank you, French language)? Well, one of my most recent street finds – one that gives me almost as much joy as the bike gives Kaya – is a Donvier Ice Cream Maker. Now anyone who grew up in the 80s knows that the Donvier Ice Cream maker was the shit when it came to small batch homemade ice cream. Okay, maybe it wasn’t all that. But when you’re a young kid and you see it in a fancy kitchen store and think of all the possibilities of homemade ice cream and spend $30 of your own hard saved up money to buy your dad a father’s day gift in the hopes that he’ll be into making ice cream every day of the week, then believe me it’s the shit. We ended up using it maybe three times. Something about the recipes for ice cream included with the maker seemed a bit too complicated. Then we put it on a shelf and promptly forgot about it. According to my dad, he gave it away several years ago during a move. And that was the end of ice cream making in our house and the end of our relationship… Just kidding! I love my dad. We get along great. But back to the story. So, imagine my delight, when I spied a genuine Donvier ice cream maker in it’s original box. Sure the box was a little worse for wear, but the maker itself – the plastic container, the plastic attachments and most importantly the cold storage barrel- were in impeccable condition. You see where I’m going with this right? Call me a nostalgic sap, but as I’ve gotten older (it’s fair to say approaching middle age (WTF!), I’ve definitely been reminiscing about my childhood and that’s become even more the case now that I myself have kids. So here I am, walking along the streets of Oakland when I’m gifted this literal blast from the past. An ice cream maker that I loved as a kid, that represented something I could share with my own father has now reentered my life so that I can share the experience of making a homemade frozen treat with my kids. I told you. Sappy.
I’m happy to say, we’ve already used the maker three times and instead of getting bogged down with complicated ice cream recipes, I’ve just decided to wing it, which is kind of how I approach cooking in general (and life, truth be told). Since it’s still summer, though nearing fall, we’ve been using strawberries because they’re in season and also because we can get really cheap delicious strawberries in the bargain section at Berkeley Bowl (remember, I’m cheap). These almost work better than the normal strawberries because they are so ripe and full of strawberry flavor. Who cares if they’re all bruised? I just cut out the bad parts and since I’m going to mash and freeze them anyway, it doesn’t even matter. So we’ve made strawberry ice cream twice (the second time I pretty much nailed it -it’s all about the half and half)). The one other time we’ve used the Donvier, we made strawberry, lemon, mint sorbet. Fortunately for you guys, I captured that occasion on video. This is what I’m talking about: confluence. You see it’s that time of year again where Kaya and I had a week to just kind of hang out before she started school (2nd grade!) and we had the time to make another cooking vid together. For this cooking session, unlike the previous two years where we opted for savory dishes (fried chicken and then chow mein) we decided to make something sweet and frozen (remember the Donvier). To up the sweetness of the video, we added another key ingredient: Mona (aka Second Daughter). You might remember her first appearance from C and K Make Granola. She’s the wild-haired 1 1/2 year old asking for crackers. Well she’s almost 4 1/2 now and it’s fair to say, she’s ready for prime time, or a night at the Improv. Don’t believe me? Watch the video.
Okay, but first things first. Here are the ingredients for our Strawberry Lemon Mint Sorbet
2 lbs strawberries
Juice of 1 lemon
1-2 tbsp of fresh mint (or to taste)
3-5 tbsp sugar (or to taste)
