Cup of Tea

蘑菇牛肋扒

病了兩天，失眠了兩天，餓了兩天。

於是起了個大早買菜去。

先到 Nino 買牛肉。站在玻璃櫃前想了老半天：上回 (8年前) 煎的是牛扒，這次就試試肋排吧。四條拿起來挺有份量的，應該夠一頓晚餐。接著選了兩盒小巧可愛的迷你鈕釦蘑菇，加上青翠的蘆筍當配菜，甜點是紅潤飽滿的草莓，單吃或淋上蜂蜜都很棒 (喔喔喔，我的肚子又餓了！)

煮菜這件事，我應該是屬於 Nigella Lawson 這派的吧 (雖然沒她那麼 messy)。我喜歡一邊作菜，一邊在心裡碎碎唸，口白很多。

好了，廢話少說。

先把肋排略沖過水，在一旁晾乾。大蒜切片、洋蔥切丁、蘑菇洗淨切半，烤箱預熱至400度。 熱油鍋後，先入肋排將兩面煎得略為焦黃 (好香好香)。 轉小火，然後放上烤盤入烤箱，先定時 12 分鐘。 

同時將蒜片洋蔥入鍋，用剛剛煎過牛扒的油將洋蔥炒至金黃，中火就好 (要好幾分鐘)。 再加入蘑菇續炒，倒入牛扒醬 (省時就用現成的)，攪拌後轉小火保溫。

在剛剛等洋蔥時，先燒一鍋水，同時處理蘆筍：洗淨、折斷底部硬的部分 (不要用切的)，水滾後丟入蘆筍，略燙過就撈起，過冰水備用。

醬好了，蘆筍就定位了，烤箱也差不多嗶了。檢視牛肉熟度，翻面再烤 5~6 分鐘。

終於到了宇宙金鋼合體的時候了！結果如下：

 

答拉~~~ 吃吧！ 肥滋滋香噴噴，冒著血管堵塞的風險，還是一口接一口。甜嫩的牛肉真是銷魂... 蘆筍的清香和牛肉算是絕配 (比館子裡邪惡的花椰菜好多了)。

這才知道什麼是「用食物溺斃所有的煩憂」啊。

吃飽喝足，清掃完廚房的殘局，再洗個熱水澡，把濺在身上的油花洗掉 (知道為什麼這道菜間隔 8 年了吧)，這才鬆了口氣。

不過史奴比說得好，失意時切忌把臉埋到盤子裡去 ─

「否則，你得到的只是一點點回憶和一個胖肚皮。」

PS1: 這是補記上週的事，只怪我中打可比蝸行。

PS2: 我喜歡的牛肉熟度是切開來只有周圍熟，但內部是深粉紅色卻不帶血水。如喜歡生一點，就早點出烤箱。

PS3: 可再加白飯或意大利粉拌醬。如要死得快一點，不如用奶油大蒜麵包... 嗯嗯，有一種豁出去的痛快呵！

Tea Eggs (12/24)

Although I don't get many chances to cook, I do enjoy cooking secretly.  It makes me happy.  It's fun to learn how things are made and done (whether it's chocalate mousse or how to change light bulbs on the top of a bridge).

For the pot luck party tonight, I decided to make tea eggs (and give our star chef a free afternoon).  The scent of tea, orange peel, star anise, Coca-cola (who'd know) and soy sauce is intoxicating in the cold winter night.

23 eggs in the pot, looking glorious!

Three hours later, after several attempts of adjusting the flavor:

They smelled divine! 

I didn't even get to taste the final result, as it was a hit at the party.  All 23 of them.  Maya is the only one  who got to try it and she told me it was yuuuumy! 

cooking spree

Where have I been the past week?  In the kitchen!

I've been having a cooking spree since the beginning of April.  It all started with a simple recipe of Thai noodle (yuummm), then snowballed into many new dishes.  So far I've done "drunken chicken", "Japanese style potato and beef stew", "tomato and beef dumplings", "beer chicken", "green onion rib" and some chinese noodle dishes.  Luckily, everything turned out delicious.  There are quite a few dishes that I want to try this week (including yummy chocalate mousse), so hopefully I'll find time to blog.

Some updates:

On Roxy- she is doing a little better now (knock on wood); the wounds are healing slowly, but she is now battleing an infection in her uterus.  Please keep the positive thoughts for her.

On Maya's speech contest- Maya had her first speech competition on Mar. 31st.  She was also the first one on stage (in a huge room).  I was relieved to see her having fun and enjoying herself through out the whole process.  She also won the first place in her group and will be representing the school (alone with other winners) in the intermural (6 schools if I remember correctly)  contest in May.  What does Maya love the most in the contest?  The medal that the school gave out to all the contestants.  She lovingly called it "my ol' medal" (without realizing what it means), because she overheard a classmate called it "gold medal". 

Lined up and ready to go in:

Maya on stage:

Maya and "Ol' medal"

If you love cooking (or trying to learn it)...

Then you should visit here.  You can see more of Amy's blog by clicking Amykaku under my cool blogs list.  http://www.wretch.cc/blog/amykaku&category_id=6818

These recipes are very easy to follow and the pics make the learning process less painful (at least for me, hee).  I'm going to try some dishes real soon and will post if they're successful.

Hope this helps you too, Ping-yi, a new wife who is relearning the art of cooking :)