Basic

I remember being in high school and going to a friend's house to hang out. There was food - I think it was some kind of potluck but the specifics escape me now. One of my friends there whispered to me before we were getting food:

Don't eat what ****'s mom cooked. It's not good.

The dish was pointed out to me. As we piled food onto our plates, I took a bit of everything, including the dish my friend told me not to eat. After all, I was curious. How bad was this "not good" food? I ate the food on my plate and when I tried that specific dish, I remember thinking it wasn't bad. No, it wasn't restaurant food. It wasn't food to die for that I'd remember for years and years to come. But as a teenager who couldn't really cook for myself at the time, it was food I'd eat.

I grew up eating pretty plain food. I don't remember my mother being a fantastic cook. I don't actually think she was. I remember her cooking Chinese vegetables, spaghetti, sardines from a can, seaweed soup, peanut noodles, ramen noodles, something with hot dogs, tv dinners, and probably dumplings. My memory is definitely not complete, but this is the span of food I remember eating growing up. Compared to the dish made at my friend's house? Pretty consistent if you ask me. That's why I wasn't phased. 

I loved eating these "TV dinners" as they were called. I even remember the quintessential flattened look of the mashed potatoes from the plastic covering. This image is quite accurate when it came to the texture of the food. 

My friend wasn't a mean person, but he ate well. I have no doubt his mom cooked delicious food, perhaps even similar to what I cook now myself. I would assume he told me this about our friend because he felt like he was helping me avoid food he wouldn't eat himself. While kind in one sense, I think it slipped his mind that I grew up with food much more basic than him. I grew up with food just like the dish he told me to avoid.

My own cooking now is a luxury even to my own standards. I really hope my children don't grow up 20 years later and tell people all they remember eating is spaghetti, chicken nuggets, and dumplings. Unlucky for them, the internet exists and will continue to exist so there's a trail of proof as to how they ate as children in the year 2025. My kids eat everything on the spectrum from boxed macaroni and cheese to homemade dim sum. I wouldn't have it any other way because I want them to still appreciate simple food.

Takeout With the Tos #6

This week's menu is special because I didn't have to go to the grocery store to buy anything! This sounds too good to be true, right? It is and isn't. You'd be surprised how much you can cook from things that save well in the freezer, pantry, and even your refrigerator! Here's how I did it.

Ingredient List:

- Chinese broccoli: I bought these last week and didn't end up cooking them. Yes, they wilted a bit throughout the week, but I cut the ends off, rehydrate in water for about a half hour, and they plump back up like fresh greens. Toss out any leaves that turned yellow or started to spot.  

- Vermicelli: These are dried mung bean noodles from the Asian grocery store. I try to stock 3-4 packs of these in my pantry at all times. The link just shows you what it is. I don't advise buying from Amazon if you can avoid it. 

- Ground Pork: I buy this from the Asian grocery store or Wild Fork. Not sponsored. But their price is great! I keep these in the freezer and thaw overnight before I use.

- Edamame: I buy the bags of shelled edamame from the Asian grocery and keep in my freezer.

- Carrots: Bought these a week ago. Still good in my fridge. Storage tip: Peel and wash your carrots and then wrap in aluminum foil. Put back in your crisper bin. They will stay fresh for longer. I've done this before when I already have older carrots and we're about to go out of town. That way I'm not forced to use them super quickly.  

- Canned bamboo and baby corn: These are another pantry staple for me. I'm sad Walmart stopped selling baby corn or I didn't find it the last time I looked. I'll try to keep 1-2 cans of each in our pantry on hand for random dishes like this week!

- Tofu: I always have at least 1-2 packs of tofu in our refrigerator. 

- Chicken Tenders: We don't formally have a grocery budget. When I see meat on sale, I will typically buy it regardless if we are eating that meat during the week. When we don't eat it, I vacuum seal it and store in our freezer. I always make sure to label and date things so I can find them easily later. The chicken I used this week was from October 2024. Not too long ago, but definitely not recent. 

Takeout Breakdown:

- Chinese Broccoli: $12.99

- Vermicelli Stir Fry: $25.99

- Edamame, Baby Corn, Bamboo: $12.99 

- Teriyaki Tofu: $15.99

- Panko Chicken Tenders (23 tenders): $38.99  

Take Out Total: $106.95

Tax: $8.82

Grand Total:  $115.77

Chinese Broccoli (bottom right):

I've made this a few times now so I won't elaborate too much. This week's was blanched in salt water. I add about 1TB of salt to ~2qt water and blanch in small batches. That's my estimate but America's Test Kitchen did a whole study on cooking green beans in salt water and why you need the salt! I think their findings can be extrapolated in part to other green vegetables as well. Really delicious by itself! 

Vermicelli Stir Fry (top left): 

This dish is inspired by the Asian recipe Ants Climbing Up a Tree. Yes, that is the literal translation of the dish. I don't follow this recipe but the overall cooking method and flavoring runs along the same lines. My true inspiration was actually my friend's dad. I'd tasted some of his food and he makes a rendition of this dish. His is definitely better, and now I know why mine will never taste as good as his. 😂

Edamame, Baby Corn, Bamboo (top right):

If you're familiar with Asian restaurants, you'll know they name their dishes by the ingredients in the dish. Hence, the name of this dish. This is definitely a dish that was put together specifically because I knew I was cooking with ingredients I already had. As explained earlier, all of these are frozen or canned and easily available at any given moment as long as I've purchased it. I add chicken bouillon seasoning with water and then thicken it with a corn starch slurry to make a sauce. It turned out great. 

Teriyaki Tofu (bottom left):

This is another repeat dish that appeared in week 1. I think this one turned out more delicious than the previous time, but you'll see this dish pop up pretty frequently. 

Panko Chicken Tenders 

I've been making chicken like this for years and years. Originally, it started out as my chicken for chicken and waffles. Recently, I've changed up the marinade to be more Asian as a stand-alone protein to match the other Asian dishes I tend to cook. In this batch, I used soy sauce, cooking wine, salt, cornstarch, and battered them with panko. I shallow fry these in about a half inch of oil between 330-350F. Approximately 3 minutes on each side, 5-6 minutes total. I originally thought I went heavy on the salt, but after cooking, I realized I could have used some more. They're still delicious and I've been dipping them in Kewpie. My kids love this chicken and when they see me cooking it, they tell me they want to eat it. Words can't describe how much it warms my heart to know my children love my cooking. 

I don't think frying food is unhealthy if you follow the following guidelines:

- fry at the correct temperature to minimize oil absorption

- fry in fresh oil for best results

- drain excess oil - I've set my chicken in a strainer so the oil can run down and out

- have fried food as a rotation with other cooking methods (I cook fried food probably < 1-2x/month)

I hope this week's menu inspires you to try to cook a week's menu without going grocery shopping for anything specific! It can be done. 😃

Total time elapsed: ~3.5 hours

Takeout With the Tos: Store-Bought Freezer Filler Meals

With the recent exception of last week's menu, we typically don't have enough food from what I cook on Sunday to make it through the week. So both as addendum food and variety, we eat fillers throughout the week. Fillers are foods we eat which I don't batch cook on Sunday afternoon. This can be a combination of store-bought freezer meals as well as batches of frozen food from homemade meals. Keep in mind any cooking which happens during the week is much more simple. 

In this post, I'm going to go over store-bought freezer filler foods we eat periodically. I know I make a lot of homemade food for my family, but I'm not above freezer chicken nuggets or dumplings.

Random assortment of what's currently in our freezer. Not sponsored. 

1. Chicken Nuggets - We love chicken nuggets. If there was a way I could get chicken nuggets to not be soggy in a hot food thermos, I'd bring them for my kid's lunch. I haven't found a way to do this yet. I've seen some youtubers stick paper towels in the thermos to absorb moisture and keep them crunchy, but I doubt the true effectiveness. So we save chicken nuggets for home when they can be eaten right after cooking.

2. Corn Dogs - My kids enjoy corn dogs here and there. My husband and I enjoy corn dogs here and there. We've done both the corn dog on a stick and mini corn dogs.

3. Frozen Dumplings - this category is anything that includes any brand of dumpling (we eat multiple), soup dumplings, or tiny wontons. Depending on how specific you get, you could almost lump them all under the category of "dumpling."

4. Frozen Noodles - I keep a small stash of premade noodle servings with vegetables. If it's convenient and I have some on hand, I will try to add a protein in since most are made vegetarian. Otherwise, it's a quick microwave and eat type meal.

5.  Tacos/Mexican - We do occasionally buy mini tacos at Costco when they're on sale and keep them on hand in our freezer. Currently, I have a pack of tamales I found on markdown. So those are on deck for a time when we need some food in a crunch. 

6. Fish Sticks - My husband and I love fish sticks. There's a guilty pleasure about eating breaded, crunchy fish late at night as a snack with homemade tartar sauce. My kids will eat it occasionally, but we seldom give it to them because somehow they end up smelling like a fish stick, even hours after eating! 

7. Lasagna - occasionally we find the frozen lasagna on sale at Costco or Sam's. This one isn't really a quick meal though since it does take a couple of hours in the oven.

#1, 2, and 6 are items we (the adults) tend to crave when we see our kids eating them. I'm not sure what it is. Perhaps it's because they're not our everyday food so they are actually more like a special treat. There are other items which make their rounds through our freezer so this list isn't all-inclusive. I actually enjoy a freezer food "treat" here and there because we don't eat it often. A number of these also turn into my dinner #2, especially when I eat dinner before 5 pm most days. These have also come in handy if we all get sick or after coming back from going out of town. If I'm feeling fancy, I'll usually pair these with some side dishes: mashed potatoes, macaroni and cheese, or broccoli with the American items or kimchi/seaweed salad with the Asian items. It ends up being quite a tasty meal!

Anyone else have guilty pleasure frozen food? 😄

Takeout With the Tos #5

Here's the takeout for this week:

- Bok Choy: $12.99

- Egg Fried Rice: $12.99

- Egg and Tomato: $15.99

- Char Siu: $12.99/lb x 2.75lb = $35.72

- Seafood Vegetable Soup: $6/qt x 6.5 qt = $39.00

- Stir Fry Turnip Greens: $12.99

Take Out Total: $129.68

Tax: $10.70

Grand Total:  $140.38

Bok Choy (top right)

Bok Choy is on the menu again, but it's actually not the same vegetable as last week. Yes, they share the same name but it's a different variant of vegetable. The leaf shape is very slightly different and I think the taste is very slightly different as well. Think about it like different types of tomatoes: Roma, Beefsteak, Heirloom, etc. There's also different types of bok choy! You'll find that this one gets repeated every two weeks or so because it's a basic staple leafy green we like to eat with our Asian food. 

Egg Fried Rice (bottom right)

Egg friend rice made it on the menu again. My kids definitely eat this once or twice a week so making it multiple weeks in a row doesn't feel like a repeat. I had some leftover fat from the pork belly I made last week so that was used to make this fried rice. 

Egg and Tomato (bottom center)

This is such a simple, basic dish most Asian people have eaten or cooked once. It was self-taught for me in the beginning. I'd scramble some eggs and then throw in tomatoes. Add some salt. Done. As the years went by, I started to doctor it up. I add ketchup to my tomato and eggs. Some people frown on this. I've always liked it so that's how I continue to make it. My sugar is in my salt/sugar shaker already so I don't add it separately. For some people, sugar is their secret ingredient. After I got the Woks of Life cookbook, I looked up the actual recipe for egg and tomato. They add shaoxing wine to the scrambled eggs before cooking. I tried this once and it enhanced the flavor very slightly. I think it's one of those ingredients where if you don't add it, you won't miss it. But, if you do add it, you can taste the difference. So sometimes I'll pour in a bit of shaoxing wine to my eggs when I remember. And other times I still make it without out of habit. 

Char Siu

We make our own char siu when I buy large cuts of meat. Two weekends ago when I was working, I told my husband to pick the food menu for the week. He and the kids flipped through our cookbook and my daughter wanted char siu. My husband put it on the menu, but upon returning home, I told him we didn't have the right cut of meat in our freezer to make this...so it wasn't made. A few days later, I was at Costco and saw their pork shoulder on sale. Yes, it's an enormous pork shoulder. Yes, I buy it about once a year. So this was my once a year pork shoulder purchase. We spent 40 minutes processing and vacuum sealing 15 pounds of pork shoulder. One turned into the char siu we ate this week. Two turned into a freezer batch of char siu. One turned into a freezer portion for this recipe.  

The recipe we follow is by Made With Lau.  I made a double batch this time so we started with 4 pounds of meat. You lose about 25% of the weight cooking so the final weight shown in the cost breakdown is pretty accurate. (Yes, we weighed it.) Making homemade char siu is actually pretty simple. We marinate the meat overnight and then bake it on raised racks to allow the fat to drip off as it cooks. Alternating basting and baking in the last half of the cooking time is the most hands-on part of this recipe. Baking this char siu took about an hour. I think we overdid it slightly this time and probably could have taken 10-15 minutes off the overall time. Depending on your cuts of meat, it varies. I may have cut my pieces a bit too thinly this time and the cooking time wasn't adjusted accordingly. This is part of the cooking/learning/experimenting process. We just eat every batch, good or bad. 

Seafood Vegetable Soup

I was feeling another batch of soup and the weather cooled down as well this week to match. This pot of soup has: tofu puffs, sweet potato, carrots, cabbage, daikon, tomatoes, and mussels. I saw recently Woks of Life came out with a winter vegetable soup recipe. I didn't follow the recipe, but it inspired me to add cabbage to my soup. I don't typically think of cabbage as a soupy vegetable, but after glancing at their recipe, I decided to add it in. Honestly, you don't notice it. It cooks down and blends in with everything else. The seasonings I add to my soup include garlic, ginger, dashi seasoning, and dried shrimp. The vegetables add everything else and I may finish with some salt for a final taste. 

Stir Fry Turnip Greens (top photo bottom left)

This was a first for us. I've never done this before. But my freezer was filling up and I had to start using some of the things in it. I have bags of greens in my freezer because the local grocery store puts them on clearance when they don't sell after a while. The greens are still find, but the best by date is nearing. I buy them, take them home, and put them into my freezer where they continue to sit until I have a recipe to use them. There are some recipes which work better for these than others. I wouldn't recommend stir frying as my top choice, but it's the method of cooking I used this time. They're not bad, but because they are pre-washed and pre-cut in the bag, I cannot control what goes in or the size of the pieces. When I cut my vegetables for stir fry, I cut the leaves larger than the stems to accommodate cooking times. This way the leaves don't overcook and allow the stems to cook through without being overly raw. This pre-cut bag did not allow for that distinction, but it turned out okay. I actually enjoyed eating this throughout the week. I'll need to add it to my mental list of freezer vegetables which can pair Asian food. 

I'm proud to say I cooked enough food this week and at the posting of this blog, none of the dishes has been completely eaten yet. 😂 This does mean we have eaten a rotation of the same foods for 4 days now. However, don't forget that we do supplement with "filler meals" here and there. I've decided next week I will post about freezer filler meals so stay tuned.

Total time elapsed: ~3 hours

The Magic of Disney

We did an extended family trip to Disney over New Year's during last year's winter break. I was secretly dreading this trip for the longest time for reasons of my own, but about two weeks before we left, I made the decision to focus on my kids and make it an enjoyable trip for them as well as myself. Honestly, it was great. We had so much fun and the kids loved the rides at the parks. They were already asking us when we were going back....on the flight home. This was a true conversation I had with my 4-year-old.

Mommy, when can we go back to Disney? Maybe in like five years.

Is that 100 days? No...that's more like 1,500 days....

My kids each got one souvenir from Disney to commemorate their bravery riding some scarier rides they wouldn't have done otherwise. I got myself a souvenir as well. We did buy a family ornament from this trip, but this souvenir was completely for me. It was a last-minute decision and I bought it right before we left for the airport. 

Earrings are my way of feeling put-together. I don't spend much time on hair unless it's a special occasion or I feel like putting in the effort, and I don't wear makeup for the same reasons. But adding a pair of earrings can elevate my overall appearance. I've experimented at home in front of the mirror when wearing a t-shirt with my hair in a messy bun. No earrings = frumpy mom mode. Earrings = subtle chic.

Normally, I can't justify spending money on souvenirs like this. I like things to have purpose and meaning. I am working on appreciating items just because we like something for the "thing" it is. My last trip to Disney was when I was around 7 or 8 myself. My mother bought me a piece of jewelry. I was always drawn to the shiny things in gift shops. That's exactly who they're advertising toward - kids/people like me who gravitate toward the sparkles and the glitter. We were in one of the gift shops and I immediately saw the tower of birthstone rings and jewelry. The irony is I always loved the ones that weren't mine - especially March. March birthstone jewelry was always blue because of aquamarine. My mother told me she would buy me my birthstone. 

This one happened to be pink for tourmaline instead of the typical opal I always saw. I agreed and my mom bought it for me. I don't think I ever wore the ring. When I was younger, it felt too special to wear. I saved it in my jewelry box for years and years. My finger eventually outgrew the ring. Yes, it has an adjustable band, but now I choose not to wear it to preserve it. The plastic stone in the left ear fell out sometime in the last 10 years. I honestly have no idea how it happened. It was like one day I went to check my jewelry box and the stone was missing. Even if all the stones fell out, I'd keep it forever. 

My mother couldn't justify spending money on things like these either. But she did, at least this one time, for me. I don't often think about the ways my mom has influenced my life because all of my adult years have been spent independently of her. I've actually appreciated not having to factor my mom's opinion into the decisions I make, but knowing she indulged me decades ago allowed me to indulge myself now.

A reunion, of sorts.

Takeout with the Tos #4

I'm really excited about this week's food. In fact, one dish is already completely eaten as of the publishing of this blog. I feel like this week's dishes have a special place in my heart. Maybe I'm just weird like that, but I get excited when there's special meaning to items. Fun fact: we visited Princeton right before my brother was in high school and ate lunch in their cafeteria. I saved the toothpick from my sandwich for YEARS after that. Because it came from Princeton University. Don't worry, it's trashed now. 

- Bok choy: $11.99

- Stir Fry Mushrooms, Green Bean, and Pork: $18.99

- Mapo Tofu: $15.99

- Pork Belly: $25.99

- Ketchup Shrimp (14 pcs): $22.99

- Egg Fried Rice: $12.99

Take Out Total: $108.94

Tax: $8.99

Grand Total: $117.93

Bok Choy (bottom center)

Believe it or not these greens were purchased a week ago and sat in my refrigerator. Due to the wonders of technological innovations, leafy vegetables can stay fresh in the crisper bin for a week. Also, if you soak the vegetables in water before cooking, they rehydrate and are basically as fresh as straight from the store. Simple stir fry with garlic, salt, and sugar. Can't go wrong.

Stir Fry Mushrooms, Green Bean, and Pork (top right)

I combined two dishes together to make this one. I've done a green bean and pork stir fry before. This was part of our menu during week 1. I've also used oyster mushrooms before. This time, I decided to julienne the oyster mushrooms and add into the stir fry with the green beans and pork. The sauce I used to season was a mix of oyster sauce, hoisin sauce, rice wine, sugar, and salt. 

Mapo Tofu (top left)

Confession: my mapo tofu is not the same as what they make in the restaurants. It's not authentic at all. I just call it mapo tofu because that is where this dish evolved from. Originally, I started with a recipe. I made it a few times, but honestly, I wasn't in love with the way it tasted. Maybe I just don't like actual mapo tofu when I make it at home. However, once I mixed my own flavor profile for sauce, I really loved this dish. My seasoning blend is a mix of black pepper sauce and sweet bean sauce. I discovered this blend because the black pepper sauce by itself wasn't sweet enough for my liking. The sweet bean sauce by itself didn't have the umami kick. So I mix the two. This is the same sauce I use when I make beef and broccoli. Hoping that will make the rounds at some point this year, but beef flank is pricey and we don't eat it often. I do still thicken the sauce with corn starch slurry like the original recipe, but my seasonings are just different. I love cooking without a recipe though because I can do it so much faster. So although recipes are wonderful to get started, my preference is still to ad lib or do it by memory. 

Pork Belly (bottom left) 

I have to watch how much pork belly I eat because this is what trigged a very long GI/digestive issue/health problems for me for much of 2023. I still remember exactly what dish it was I cooked and I don't think I've made it in nearly two years because I'm traumatized. If you're curious, it's Thai basil pork belly.  I absolutely loved the flavor of Thai basil pork belly and it was one of my favorites, but I haven't been able to make it in years. This pork belly dish I cooked is just marinated in brown sugar, soy sauce, cooking wine, sesame oil, and pan fried. I do have to cook a lot of the fat out of it so it's not as moist as it could be, but I'd like not to feel sick for multiple months again. This is definitely still a rich dish, but it's very delicious, and as long as my body doesn't revolt on me, it will be in the rotation periodically. Some day I may try making Thai basil pork belly again. Maybe later this year if I'm brave.

Ketchup Shrimp (bottom right)

This was size 9-14 head-on shrimp. I love the big shrimp. My aunt who lives in the northeast would buy the jumbo sized shrimp (almost the size of a 40 oz Stanley water bottle lid) and cook it for us when we visited during the summer. My shrimp are not as big as those but as big as I can get for a reasonable amount of money locally. I honestly can't remember if I grew up eating this dish. My guess is I did. But over the years, I forgot about it. After my son was born, it was Covid. One of my auntie friends, whom I consider almost like a second mother, helped cook some dishes for us each week for four weeks and would drop it off on our porch. One week, she made ketchup shrimp. Eating it again brought me back to my childhood somehow, as if I'd tasted this flavor before. I absolutely loved it and told myself I would learn how to make this dish. And I did. I follow the recipe by Woks of Life. When I received my cookbook, this was the first recipe I looked for. I was very sad it wasn't included, but I realize 80% of the people who buy their cookbook probably wouldn't be looking for this recipe. So I'm glad it's on their website. My kids love ketchup shrimp. My daughter asks me to peel hers for her, and when I'm patient, I'll hold it out for her to suck the sauce off first. 

Egg Fried Rice (top middle)

I wasn't planning on making a fried rice on my cooking day. Normally, this becomes a filler dish I cook mid-week when we start running out of food. But when I realized I forgot to use the last cube of garlic I'd thawed, I figured I'd make some fried rice and throw the garlic in there so it wouldn't go to waste. My friend came over during high school (or was it a summer of a college year?) and taught me how to make fried rice. I had no idea you had to put the eggs in last. Silly me. I don't think the fried rice I make would be Uncle Roger approved, but it feeds my kids without complaint so I'll take it. I really hope egg prices come back down soon. 

I find a lot of joy in cooking for my family every week. Delicious food is a great plus, but I also love the stories that these dishes hold. I hope my kids will keep my stories and also have their own stories with our food and pass it down in years to come. 

Total time elapsed: 3.5 hours.