A Bachelor's Weblog to Urban Cooking where speed and simplicity comes before taste!

a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/provencal_new_potatoes/" title="Provencal New Potatoes"img src="http://simplyrecipes.com/photos/provencal-new-potatoes-a.jpg" alt="Provencal New Potatoes" //a pYou know Prince Charming? The tall, dark, handsome guy who comes riding up on a white horse to whisk you away to a fantasy life at some medieval castle? Well, my tall, dark, handsome guy doesn't have a horse or a castle; he's French and he loves to cook. (Now that's a prince!) He cooks intuitively, without recipes, so when he makes something that turns out especially good, I beg him to make it again, so I can capture the recipe. Recently he made the most wonderful batch of tiny new potatoes, roasted with onions, tomatoes, garlic, olives, and olive oil, and seasoned with herbes de Provence. We've remade it a couple of times since just because it's so so good. The little potatoes are like savory potato candies, with caramelized bits of onions and tomatoes. /p a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/provencal_new_potatoes/" class="new"p class="extended"Continue reading "Provencal New Potatoes" »/a/p pa href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/D4l5LfLVeA1w-J2a8CZlx7Ut7HM/0/da"img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/D4l5LfLVeA1w-J2a8CZlx7Ut7HM/0/di" border="0" ismap="true"/img/abr/ a href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/D4l5LfLVeA1w-J2a8CZlx7Ut7HM/1/da"img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/D4l5LfLVeA1w-J2a8CZlx7Ut7HM/1/di" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/p

a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/sichuan_eggplant/" title="Sichuan Eggplant"img src="http://simplyrecipes.com/photos/sichuan-eggplant-a.jpg" alt="Sichuan Eggplant" //a pemAre eggplants showing up in your local markets yet? They are here, and guest author a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/contributor/garrett"Garrett/a has tossed together a classic Chinese dish using long and tender asian eggplants from the farmers market. Enjoy! ~Elise/em/p pThe actual name for this dish in Sichuan cuisine oddly translates to "Fish-Fragrant" Eggplant. Confusing, as this dish has no fish anywhere in it. You see, in Sichuan cuisine there are 23 complex flavors. These range from red-oil flavor, hot and sour flavor, lychee flavor, to strange flavor, and many others. Fish-Fragrant is one of the most celebrated. /p pFish-Fragrant is a combination of salty, sweet, sour, and spicy tastes that come from ginger, garlic, scallions and fermented or pickled chilies. It is so named because these flavors are often used to enhance fish. Often times in earlier Chinese history, if home cooks were unable to procure fresh fish for meals, they had to make do with older fish that might have had too intense of a fishy taste. The ingredients and tastes that make up the fish-fragrant flavor are all strong and could cover the odors of seafood that wasn't the most fresh./p a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/sichuan_eggplant/" class="new"p class="extended"Continue reading "Sichuan Eggplant" »/a/p pa href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/nr-CcVJiQSGpS-fu4R5Py6jQdP4/0/da"img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/nr-CcVJiQSGpS-fu4R5Py6jQdP4/0/di" border="0" ismap="true"/img/abr/ a href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/nr-CcVJiQSGpS-fu4R5Py6jQdP4/1/da"img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/nr-CcVJiQSGpS-fu4R5Py6jQdP4/1/di" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/p

a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/cherry_tomato_orzo_salad/" title="Cherry Tomato Orzo Salad"img src="http://simplyrecipes.com/photos/cherry-tomato-orzo-feta-salad.jpg" alt="Cherry Tomato Orzo Salad" //a pI am not the most talented of gardeners. I over-water, under-water, over-fertilize, under-mulch. I plant little plants behind big plants, blocking out their sun. I then transplant my poorly placed plants to what I'm hoping will be a better location and almost kill them in the process. No, if a plant survives with me in charge it's because it's one heckova sturdy plant, or just has a strong will to live. I have been getting better at this over the years, but it still surprises me how difficult growing tomatoes can be, with the singular exception of the glorious sungold tomato. Do you know about the sungold? It's a cherry tomato, or the size and shape of a cherry tomato, but brightly orange colored when ripe./p a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/cherry_tomato_orzo_salad/" class="new"p class="extended"Continue reading "Cherry Tomato Orzo Salad" »/a/p pa href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/4C7LJLQUPyQkKZqchN8Ukn7ZFIE/0/da"img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/4C7LJLQUPyQkKZqchN8Ukn7ZFIE/0/di" border="0" ismap="true"/img/abr/ a href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/4C7LJLQUPyQkKZqchN8Ukn7ZFIE/1/da"img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/4C7LJLQUPyQkKZqchN8Ukn7ZFIE/1/di" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/p

a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/grilled_onion_salad/" title="Grilled Onion Salad"img src="http://simplyrecipes.com/photos/grilled-onion-salad-a.jpg" alt="Grilled Onion Salad" //a pA grilled onion salad. Why not? Grilled onions can be just as good chilled as hot, especially when you let them marinate in an herb dressing. The grilling produces all sorts of caramelized goodness in the onions, taming their bite and bringing out their natural sweetness. An herby dressing acts like a marinade, further softening the onions, and infusing them with flavor. The best thing? The salad lasts for days, and actually improves with age, as the dressing soaks into the onions. So, it's a great party make-ahead salad./p a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/grilled_onion_salad/" class="new"p class="extended"Continue reading "Grilled Onion Salad" »/a/p pa href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/cCC6CVZ6UqS1CNMxfhH16ZDZXDg/0/da"img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/cCC6CVZ6UqS1CNMxfhH16ZDZXDg/0/di" border="0" ismap="true"/img/abr/ a href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/cCC6CVZ6UqS1CNMxfhH16ZDZXDg/1/da"img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/cCC6CVZ6UqS1CNMxfhH16ZDZXDg/1/di" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/p

a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/korean_spicy_cold_noodles/" title="Korean Spicy Cold Noodles"img src="http://simplyrecipes.com/photos/korean-spicy-cold-noodles.jpg" alt="Korean Spicy Cold Noodles" //a pRecently returned from a year teaching English in Korea, my friend Kerissa Barron has been introducing me to some of her favorite dishes, including this one, a spicy cold noodle salad, with lots of toppings. It's known as embibim guksu/em in Korean, and if you've ever had a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bibimbap"bibimbap/a, it's a lot like that, but chilled, and with thinly sliced raw vegetables and a hard cooked egg. The sauce that holds it all together is sweet and spicy and made with red chili paste, rice vinegar, sugar, and sesame. So good! I recommend making extra sauce and just keeping some around to dress up leftovers. The meal comes together quickly, the most time needed to cut up the vegetables./p a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/korean_spicy_cold_noodles/" class="new"p class="extended"Continue reading "Korean Spicy Cold Noodles" »/a/p pa href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/GTHNpRbjnQEiMVnIf58XCLifPmY/0/da"img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/GTHNpRbjnQEiMVnIf58XCLifPmY/0/di" border="0" ismap="true"/img/abr/ a href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/GTHNpRbjnQEiMVnIf58XCLifPmY/1/da"img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/GTHNpRbjnQEiMVnIf58XCLifPmY/1/di" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/p

a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/vietnamese_daikon_and_carrot_pickles/" title="Vietnamese Daikon and Carrot Pickles"img src="http://simplyrecipes.com/photos/carrot-daikon-pickles-vertical-400.jpg" alt="Vietnamese Daikon and Carrot Pickles" //a pYou know when you learn how to make something new, and it's so good, and so easy to make, that you think back with regret to all the years you've lived without knowing how to do this thing? That's how I feel about these Vietnamese a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daikon"daikon/a and carrot refrigerator pickles, also known as "do chua". The pickles are traditionally served on Vietnamese a href="http://battleofthebanhmi.com/"banh mi/a sandwiches. They're a little like bread and butter pickles, though crispier, not as sweet, and with a slight radish taste from the daikon. If you are unfamiliar with daikon radishes, they are very large, long (over a foot), white, mild radishes. Pickled daikon, sliced crosswise, are often served with your food at Japanese restaurants./p a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/vietnamese_daikon_and_carrot_pickles/" class="new"p class="extended"Continue reading "Vietnamese Daikon and Carrot Pickles" »/a/p pa href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/VKZ5CPnh1sbSTumvwsZq2PrPLw4/0/da"img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/VKZ5CPnh1sbSTumvwsZq2PrPLw4/0/di" border="0" ismap="true"/img/abr/ a href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/VKZ5CPnh1sbSTumvwsZq2PrPLw4/1/da"img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/VKZ5CPnh1sbSTumvwsZq2PrPLw4/1/di" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/p

a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/grilled_english_peas/" title="Grilled English Peas"img src="http://simplyrecipes.com/photos/grilled-english-peas.jpg" alt="Grilled English Peas" //a pAre you familiar with a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edamame"edamame/a, the salty soybeans often served at Japanese restaurants? I became addicted to them when I lived in Japan years ago; they're the Japanese version of bar nuts, almost always served at bars there, with beer. You eat them by putting the pod in your mouth, closing your teeth, and pulling out the pod which releases the salty beans to eat. (Trader Joe's carries them, by the way.) This recipe is sort of like an English pea version of edamame, that you grill. Okay, yeah it's a stretch, but you eat them like edamame. You take fresh English peas, toss them with olive oil and salt, and then grill them until they are lightly charred on the outside and steamy soft on the inside. Then when you eat them, you scrape up some of that smokey, charred, salty flavor, while the peas pop into your mouth. If you want to add to this symphony of flavors, you can sprinkle some balsamic and chopped mint on the peas before eating. /p a href="http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/grilled_english_peas/" class="new"p class="extended"Continue reading "Grilled English Peas" »/a/p pa href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/zmQJlAvvxSd_o7K5FPiObwR_ogg/0/da"img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/zmQJlAvvxSd_o7K5FPiObwR_ogg/0/di" border="0" ismap="true"/img/abr/ a href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/zmQJlAvvxSd_o7K5FPiObwR_ogg/1/da"img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/zmQJlAvvxSd_o7K5FPiObwR_ogg/1/di" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/p