Blog Carnival: August 2010

"So what is a Blog Carnival you ask?”

It is EtsyMetal members who write an article on the same topic on the first Monday of each month.

*the picture below is from the Sockeye 2009 Salmon season, Sara and David of NakNek Seafood brought back this booty of roe for me and boy was my family in heaven, it will be a famous food year to remember for sure, thank you!

August Topic: Food for Thought...

...as the sun gently sets it illuminates the frozen soon to be delicious golden orbs...

...as I watch and wait anxiously for the thawing to end...

...alas! it is time to season to perfection!

...now waiting in anticipation for the golden orbs to orgasmically pop between my teeth ....

"What do you eat?"  I love most foods, I love salty-savory goodness and garlic. If I could eat just one thing every day and it was nutritionally complete, I would eat Salmon eggs, roe, Ikura, caviar every day all day! But being as it is all fatty oil, I think I would go into cardiac shock and look like a giant oily fish egg :) Homestyle recipe is simply to prepare it by just separating off skien, then adding lemon, shoyu and salt, marinate 1 day.  I will get my homestyle Ikura tutorial up soon on the Takasissies Blog. If you need the recipe info sooner just email me!

So moving along, hmm, I love almost all seafood, raw, cooked and sometimes even living, hence a lovely Kumamoto oyster now and then! I LOVE vegetables, mostly greens like kale, mustards, chard, I also love beans, sprouted Mung beans with black mustards seeds oh my! I am getting so excited thinking about all these yummies now its hard to define favorites, but I will go on. Excuse me for being a bit scattered but there are so many lovely foods to think about! The picture on the left is a home grown Shiso leaf with a pat of rice and a generous dollop of homestyle prepared Ikura.  So I love rich foods, but seafood and greens would have to top my list!

"What won't you eat?"

I will not eat Natto. Nope, never again, ew...

okay IF I was starving I might.  For those of you who are unfamiliar with this Japanese food here is a "description of Natto."  Ok on the positive side I think it is kinda classified as a superfood, BUT what you cannot tell from the pictures is the smell, (sour-cheesy-slimy-putrid-feet-times 1000) you cannot feel the texture, did I mention the smell? ok enough, I apologize to the Natto lovers out there may you be forever healthy and strong. The picture on the left was ironically taken exactly 1 year ago when I first smelled and tasted it!?

I will not knowingly eat eyeballs, penis, balls, colons, stomachs, brains of any animal OR anything that is wiggling, I have to draw the line somewhere. The New Years Day fish, someone always eats the eyeball. Its supposed to be an honor. No thank you. Here is a not so funny at the time story. My cousin had the NYday party at her beautiful house as usual, and one of my second cousins prepared and endless supply of the best tasting chicken nuggets I have ever tasted, everyone was gobbling them up and havind a great old time, near the end of the evening it was revealed that these amazing nuggets were not chicken at all, hmmm. Well it was delicous at the time and knowing now what they were I prefer not to eat that part of a bull. Some people were definately angry, I was a bit of a nasty joke but, I can say now I've eaten "Rocky Mountain Oysters or Cowboy Caviar." Again, moving along now...another little factoid is that I do not eat sweets like cakes, cookies, pies and candy. I can/will eat it but if I have a choice I prefer not. Well let me rephrase,  I DO like some unique pieces of candy usually not your common american variety, and sometimes a slice of (salted) watermelon once in a while can be nice, but shoving a candy bar in my mouth is not even slightly appealing to me, and did I mention part of it has to do with the sticky factor..... I'm a bit sticky-phobic. :)

 

"Do you suggest any interesting pairings?"

It must be one of those weird taste-melding things, but I LOVE eating Sprouts and Fish, it mixes together and makes a unique almost metallic flavor, an unusual little flavor I found I liked.

Oh another I discovered last summer was to take a Tsukemono pickled Shiso leaf and wrap it around a cold piece of sweet corn on the cob, yum!

Then there is Tobitoes (my friend Carter came up w/this cute name) It is a dish that is usually served at my families potluck parties. It is mashed Potatoes, Cucumber, cooled and add BestFoods mayo, splash of seasoned rice wine vinegar and Tobiko, if it is around the holidays you can make it festive and buy red and green Tobiko! Otherwise I just use the normal orange. Creamy, slightly sweet and salty goodness!

I could go on but I must stop now! You can find some recipes on the Takasissies Blog, and I will be adding recipes there hopefully this summer I have been saving up lots of pics as I learn to make new foods!

Personal favorites:

Also I need to add this, it may be a tad  bit wierd and strong for most, but if you love garlic then this might be for you! I just love it and cannot get enough when I make it, it is fried Elephant Garlic slices! Slice and fry in oil with salt until golden brown, note that they will stiffen up like bacon after you pull them out of the pan and stick onto a paper towel to soak up the extra oil, then voila eat like potato chips! yum!

OK! ok ok ok, just one more favorite,  "Shishamo!"

You can order it in a variety of ways but my personal favorite is deep fried, no batter added. Shishamo is a little fish(smelt?) that is heavy with eggs, as you can see in the picture. As far as I know they usually are thrown in the fryer frozen. And they always have eggs in them.

Latest discoveries:

Takana Roll @ Sushiland, it is pickled Mustard Greens maki sushi roll. I just bought a little can of pickled mustard greens to try out I hope they are good!

Kale chips: dehydrated with red bell pepper, garlic, cashews, nutri-yeast and other goodness. If you get the opportunity to try these somehow I highly reccomend it!

Double D Meats: has this incredible Brie, it comes in at random to my butcher and is cut from a giant wheel, it is packaged there in house, there is no info on the label, very inexpensive, and it is the most amazing brie I have had locally yet! Sadly is that they are always out! Its probably best they are always running out. :)

 

"What is your favorite studio snack?"

This is a hard one because while I work I cannot be touching greasy foods, I really do not like to eat with my hands because of obvious reasons. So usually I pick at dried pickled ginger and salted dried plum we call sourballs. It is kind of considered a candy maybe, but it is not really sweet, more of a snack, but really too salty to be considered a food snack. Something you can pick on tiny bites with very strong flavor. Which reminds me, I am out of both right now!  Natural Style Beef Jerky is also an easy studio snack for me. I love to eat Vlasic Dill Pickle Sunflower seeds while walking the dogs, but I have not mastered the "mouth only" technique and cannot eat them in the studio, maybe someday!

So I do not eat in my studio much. My favorite drinks are an Italian soda without cream. I make it with a splash of Monin syrup, and Club Soda with a tiny drop of Peppermint extract over ice with a straw! These are my current favorite flavors, Lavender, Jasmin and Rose. If you have a Cash & Carry in your area they have wide selection and cost right under $5 a bottle.

Ok this is all I have time for I could go on forever and ever, tee hee hee :) Here is a link to my Flickr Yummy Food File if you want to take a peek at more (tr)eats!
Thanks for reading I hope you had fun here, below are some team members that have blogged on the same subject this month, thanks for reading and have a great day and eat lots of great food!

 

nina gibson 

stacey hansen

thomasin durgin

inbar bareket

lauren anabela beaudoin

maria whetman

beth cyr
cynthia delgiudice

ann hartley

caitlyn davey