It's been awhile, but I'm here and cookin'

Well it's sure been awhile since I posted anything, but I swear its not my fault! I've been really busy, first I went to vegas which was out of control. I stayed at Caesar's palace, where I found out that Bobby Flay has a restaurant there. For those of you who don't know who Bobby Flay is, he is an Iron Chef on the Food Network and has two other shows. He is a great chef and someone I watch a lot on television. I was very enthused, but I wasn't able to eat there. I showed up after a show had just let out at about 9 at night and we were too starving to wait an hour to eat dinner. So I had to leave. It was very disappointing... maybe some day, Bobby Flay. So after maybe 36 hours of not sleeping, I came back to San Francisco, exhausted and ready to sleep. Throughout the week I cooked the most I could, but towards the end got terribly sick, and I've been sick ever since! I almost didn't make it to Thanksgiving at my grandmothers. So I have not cooked for over a week now, which has been really depressing, been eating top Ramen and canned soup, gourmet indeed. I'm feeling a bit better, still have an intense cough, but have enough energy to blog again.

I finally found the right pasta to make worms with! As you can see above.

So I went to the store at the beginning of the month and bought all the things I thought I would need for a couple weeks to cook. I bought a lot of Talapia because its a light fish, that's cheap and easy to cook. Now the other day I had bought bread crumbs, instead of Panko, because the store was all out of Panko. I did not use them though, but they were just sitting in the cabinet so I decided to try out a healthier adventure for them. I thawed out some Talapia that I had in the freezer and when it was still wet, I patted some bread crumbs onto it. I chopped up some garlic and started to cook it in Olive oil, finally I put the fillet in and cooked it with the garlic and olive oil. The fish came out crunchy and flavorful and I placed it with some mixed greens. Then I had a thought! I let the olive oil left in the pan cool enough and I put it on my salad with some balsamic vinegar, so I had a delicious garlic salad and talapia lunch. Light and great to eat.

Bread Crumb Talapia with a Garlic Olive Oil Salad

A fast and easy lunch.

Finally I was feeling really adventurous, I wanted to try something I'd never done before so I decided to make tempura. So I found a simple tempura recipe and could not wait to try it out! It seemed like a good idea at the time, but it really didnt seem to be working out, I kept burning the green beans! Which is terrible, because I love green beans, I dont want to burn them. So I tried and tried and eventually this is what came out of it.

Vegetable and Shrimp Tempura

Oh how pretty it looks! Too bad it tasted terrible. It was really really soggy and just... kinda gross. So I failed that test, but I really tried. Do you like the plate? I found it on the street in a box... Its fairly awesome. I dont really know what it's for but I like it. Dont worry guys, I'll try again in the Tempura, once I get a deep fryer and a better recipe.

I bought a lot of tomatoes while I was at the store, some canned and some fresh. I wanted to make a quick dinner for my girlfriend and my friend but I didnt just want to eat chicken and rice. So I decided to make a sauce, that consisted of Olive oil, garlic, tomatoes and cream. In the end it was so delicious to eat with the rice and greatly successful. I really am happy that i can put together some sauces nowadays, it really helps.

Chicken and Tomato Cream Sauce

I had a lot of left over rice from the dish above. When I was growing up and would sleep over at my sisters house her mom used to make us something in the mornings we called Rice cereal. It was just left over rice with milk, sugar and raisins, and it was extremely delicious and a great way to use the left over rice. But the next morning I didn't have any raisins, so i replaced it with sliced almonds and ate it just the same. It was delicious and reminded me of childhood!

Rice Cereal

I really wanted some Floutas from Chevys, if you've ever had them, they are awesome! Especially at happy hour, because you have the giant margaritas and the chicken floutas and they are all half off. So good, way better then making margaritas at home with the overly sugary margarita mix. Anyways, I found the recipe for the Chevys floutas online and couldn't get all of the ingredients but I got as many as I could and added extra cheese. I mean... who doesn't like extra cheese? I also wanted to make some mexican rice, now my friend tried to explain to me it was not as easy as it sound, but i was more confident then that. But... a lot of my rice got burned around the sides, like... terribly burned but the rice in the middle turned out delicious!

Chicken and Cheese Floutas

I should make these more often!