Dinner Party: Bull Riding and B&E

If there’s one thing I like, it’s a good Friday night. D’habitude, I crack open a few (several… many) cold ones with the lover boy and we just hang out in the kitchen watching YouTube videos and Jeopardy, or we go play pool and hang out with friends. It’s rare that we have people over for dinner because our kitchen and dining table are quite small but this last Friday, we hosted a couple of friends and cooked them a nice meal. (Back story: for the past year, Liam and I had this tiny <21″ inch TV perched on a guitar amp. We never used it because it was the same size as my laptop so we decided to get rid of it.) Our friends had an extra TV that they didn’t use, so we did a little trade. Dinner and wine for a TV. It was pretty much a win-win for everyone. They get rid of something they don’t need and they get a delicious dinner and lots of wine. We get a new TV, get to play dinner party hosts for our friends and make/eat a delicious dinner. It was fun to be an ~*~*adult*~*~ and still have a lot of fun.

Now I want to warn you, I didn’t follow through with my goal from my last post, nor did I take my self-critique into account at all. I took one picture of the meal and I figured that would be enough. Mind you, when the final plate was ready, I had already had three glasses of wine and I was starving and very excited. I wanted to take more pictures during the process but it was mostly just prep. Maybe I’ll ask someone to take some pictures for me while I cook.

I made a salad using this dressing that I had tasted at my mom’s last week. It’s a very characteristic salad, a little sour, mildly nutty (due to the sesame oil & seeds) and just

Top Left, clockwise: Maple syrup, light soy sauce, sesame oil, rice vinegar, a little ceramic cactus I made snuggling with a single clove of garlic, sesame seeds (which ended up being ground up)

salty enough.  The taste reminds me of what seaweed salad would taste like without the seaweed. If you look at the recipe, you’ll see that it gives you three optional ingredients which you can choose from, all I had was garlic so that’s what I used (no complaints). For the greens, I just used some spring mix and cucumbers, it was really simple and just catalyzed the flavour the dressing (Leaves carried the sauce and the cucumbers absorbed). After discovering this dressing, I feel like I could totally be vegan, just toss an assortment of veggies into a bowl and toss it in this dressing. Soooo good ❤
Somethings I would change for next time: More maple syrup, a bit more soy sauce or just less rice vinegar.

The main course was “honey” lime & cilantro salmon fillets. This is the recipe that I used except I didn’t have any honey so I used maple syrup. It was shared by my auntie who HATES cilantro (she says that it’s “offensive”) and wanted to try making the dish without it. I’m not THAT picky and I don’t find cilantro offensive, so I wanted to give

a suuuuper bad picture that doesn’t do my success in the kitchen any justice whatsoever. Sooo yummy though.

a go at making it. It was nice too because I had a reason to try a new and “fancier” (than I’m used to) recipe. I served it with a little scoop of rice. I really enjoyed the whole experience of trying something new, cooking for and eating with friends, and just drinking and socializing. I had never cooked fish by myself but I was confident going into it. The recipe was easy to follow and with no difficult techniques and it was really delicious. It was super tart from the lime, but sweet from the maple syrup. It was moist and flaky, the way a salmon fillet should be. My fork just ripped it apart and separated the flesh in layers. Do you see the picture I’m trying to paint or is my description making you see some messed up things? I can’t explain it!!! But it was good stuff, and the texture was perfect.
Somethings I would change for next: More maple syrup and/or less lime, more garlic, cook longer skin side down to try to get a little bit of crisp. Reduce the cooking liquid a little bit longer. Be patient and take a fucking better picture next time.

So to bring this post to a close, I want to share some sketches from Portlandia that cracked me up. I love Fred Armisen so much. Just a disclaimer: I am not anti-vegan or anything! Farts just make me laugh.

xoxo lil foodie princess

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