Teriyaki Chicken Bowl

Driving along today, I was having a familiar internal monologue, "What do I do with freakin' chicken today?"  As most of you know, I can get into my "I hate chicken and am so bored to death with chicken" mindset very easily.  As I ran through past recipes in my mind, I had a thought of something else.  Thank God!

Teriyaki chicken rice bowls! 

I mixed up a simple marinade of lemon, soy sauce, hot sauce, oil, garlic and ginger. I scored my chicken breasts and got them marinating for a few hours.  Next step was preparing the teriyaki sauce.  In a small saucepan, I combined the following and brought to a boil.  Once boiling, turn off the heat and let it boil by itself for 1 minute.  Strain it (easier to do this while it's still hot) and set aside to cool.  

• 1/4 c. water
• 3 Tbs brown sugar
• 1 Tbs cornstarch (or flour)
• 1/4 tsp grated fresh ginger
• 1/4 tsp minced garlic
• 1/4 c. soy sauce
• 1/8 c. apple cider vinegar
• 1 Tbs honey

Next, I marinated some edamame in Mirin and prepared some scallions with a  light coat of oil.

Now, I will admit to one short-cut here. I used a pre-made, frozen vegetable fried rice by Innovasian as the base.  Grilled the scallions and chicken, glazing the chicken with the teriyaki.  Then, Viv and I built the bowls with rice, grilled/charred scallion, sliced grilled teriyaki chicken, edamame and toasted sesame seeds, all drizzled with a sriracha mayo we mixed up.  Such a great change for our lowly chicken!  The crunch of the sesame was a fantastic textural element and I must say, the sriracha mayo was just perfect. I hope you may decide to give this a try. Definitely helped us with the chicken doldrums!

Yet another good salmon

Around here, we eat salmon as often as possible.  We eat it for the obvious reasons...it's good for us, it's versatile, it's tasty.  However, I think the main reason I continue to cook it often and try new recipes is that my 8 year old loves salmon.  I mean, she really loves it. Glazed with honey & vermouth, smoked on the grill, broiled with Dijon and bread crumb topping, any way you can come up with.  I found a recipe on Pinterest months ago for a teriyaki salmon with sriracha cream.  The photo is just beautiful and I have been going back and stalking my own Pinterest board to see the picture. My hold up in making it was that I didn't have any sriracha and when cruising through the grocery store, the thought of sriracha just never popped into my head.

Well, recently, I paid a little visit to one of my favorite places, the Chef'Store.  As I wandered slowly through the aisles, I spotted the sriracha.  Ah hah!  I snatched up a bottle and headed straight for the checkout.  I knew what we were having for dinner that night.  I got home, pulled up Pinterest and got started.  I made the teriyaki sauce from scratch, as outlined in the recipe, but I think you could easily get away with using prepared teriyaki, so don't let that deter you.  It was all very easy to prepare and the result was dynamite. I really love this girl's site too. It's called Damn Delicious and she's got tons of awesome recipes posted there.

Results for the Akre house?  Thumbs up from the little one and an exchange of cool guy nods between me and the hubster.

I think this looks just beautiful!

 One thing I'll say is that this makes way more sriracha cream than 3 people will eat at one sitting.  Probably more than even 6 people would use.  So, whatever could I do? 

Sriracha cream sauce ingredients

 I came up with an EXCELLENT use for the leftover sauce, if I do yell so myself in my shouty capitals. I fried up some green tomatoes and drizzled with the sauce.  You may have felt the Earth move a little that day.  Or, perhaps you heard the loud Hosanna! as I bit into that first one.  Crispy, tart, almost holy fried green tomatoes with an obligatory sprinkling of salt and that spicy sriracha deliciousness mixed all up in 'dere. 

I want another plate of these right now!

As I contemplated the success of this pairing, I began to imagine how else I could use up this divine leftover sauce. Some of my ideas were as a dip for boiled shrimp, mixed with cabbage for a spicy slaw on a fish or shrimp taco or even to shake up a chicken and waffle dealio.  So, don't worry about the amount of sauce this makes.  You'll find all kinds of great uses for it.  I'd love to hear about them.

Fujiya Funbox

One of Vivi's favorite cuisines is Japanese.  Unfortunately, the Japanese steakhouse closest to our house is, IMO, a dump. It's about 100 years old and the decor has clearly never been updated nor has the place been cleaned.  We can go to Assembly Street, or St. Andrews or the Northeast to find good Japanese food.  But, there's something even closer.

Fujiya on Rosewood Drive is just a couple minutes from our neighborhood.  I've driven by it a zillion times but never ventured in.  I noticed on Facebook one day that my friend Eugenie was there, so I asked her about it.  Turns out she & her family go there pretty often.  So, I decided to give it a try.  I took Vivi to lunch one day a couple of months ago.  Since then, we've been back two more times.  

Is this the best Japanese restaurant in town?  No.  But it's a good one and it's so convenient for us to get there whenever the craving hits.  It's a small place, the hibachi chef is actually Japanese (the dump's chefs are Hispanics...I mean, that's just odd) and the wait staff is attentive.  So far, we've only been there for lunch and what I want to share with you is what a good deal they are for lunch.  They call it the "Lunchbox."  

Viv's beloved teriyaki chicken Bento

My shrimp Lunchbox

Connoisseur

It's a Bento box with your choice of shrimp, chicken or NY strip teriyaki, tempura, gyoza, salad with ginger dressing and either steamed or fried rice. Vivi loves the chicken so much, that she always plows right through that before trying anything else in her box.  The chef cooks at a hibachi table that you can see, but it's not at your table.  

We were excited to see that they offer red bean ice cream, but disappointed to learn that they didn't have any today.  If you have never eaten red bean ice cream or red bean seed pastries, do yourself a favor and order it whenever you see it show up on a menu.  Fujiya, Inakaya and the Blue Cactus are the only places I know of in Columbia who carry the ice cream. In the absense of the ice cream, we opted instead for strawberry ice cream mochi.  Good, but not red bean!  :-)

Like I said, this isn't the best in town, but it's pretty darn good.  What I mean is that this isn't high gourmet, but good, typical offerings of Japanese fare. I like the fact that it's a small, neighborhood place where we can eat lunch that consists of real food for the same price that someone else pays to feed their kids McStuff. The wait staff is always pleasant and they keep a close eye on you and take care of you.  It's a good experience and I especially enjoy my lunch dates with my little girl! 

Girls' Night Out

Neil was out of town for a couple of days this week, leaving us girls to our own devices Wednesday night.  So, we decided to make the most of it.  

We started with a play-date with a little girl who lives around the corner.  Vivian thoroughly inspected each of the kid's toys, banged out a few tunes on their piano, checked out the vermi-composting in the backyard, then we all headed out to the park for some good ol' fashioned playground fun.

Upon returning home, we got ready for our big night out together.  My sweet baby child is a pretty good litte eater.  While I haven't been able to get her to give sushi a try, she LOVES Japanese food.  So, we both had to get dressed up in fancy dresses, Vivian said.  She selected her entire outfit and then adorned her hair with as many bows and do-dads as possible.  She topped off this ensemble with a white faux fur cape, and we hit the road.

Fancy Schmancy

We went to one of those Japanese steakhouses, Sato in Forest Acres.  I knew going in that this particular place is my least favorite in town.  But, it's close to home and on this outing, that was most important.  First off, everyone that we encountered and passed by greatly admired Vivian's most fancy outfit.  She did look really cute, I must say.  We were seated with a family of mom, dad & their 7 year old girl and a couple down at the end.  Everyone seemed intrigued to see how a little kid would act and eat in a place like this.

This is not an actual photo from our dinner (full disclosure)

Well, this ain't Viv's first rodeo. My parents introduced her to Yamato's a couple years ago, so she knows how to handle a pair of kid chopsticks.  By the way, Yamato's blows the doors off Sato.   Vivian's meal consisted of a Shirley Temple, soup, and teriyaki chicken.  The chef showed her how to use her chopsticks to (effectively) eat rice with them.  I was so impressed; the child ate rice with sticks!  I can barely use chopsticks, so this is very exciting to this Mommy.  Anyway, she loved her meal and her big, grown-up Girls' Night Out.  We went home, got in comfy jammies and cuddled up on the couch to watch Food Network until she fell asleep.  

I just wanted you all to know.

The Dreaded Turkey Burger

I started using ground turkey in lieu of hamburger years ago: chili, tacos, lasagna, chinese dumplings. But, whenever I tried an actual burger, it was always a disappointment. They would either turn out horribly dry, or they'd just fall apart. Plus, sometimes, the whitish appearance of turkey just doesn't scream "hamburger" at me. It's kinda creepy really.

Well, a couple months ago, I was thumbing through a magazine and saw an ad/recipe by Kikkoman for a teriyaki turkey burger. Helloooo...now this sounded interesting! So, I made them and they were fantastic. You make the burgers with turkey of course, teriyaki glaze, green onion, and ginger (ummm, my favorite). Then, as you grill them, you baste them with more glaze. At the same time, you're grilling pineapple slices with the glaze. Melt some provolone, swiss or monterrey jack on top and there you go. I was an instant convert!

I bring this up now, because at the time, I made extras and put them in the freezer. This morning, I took two out to thaw, so I'm daydreaming about my new favorite turkey burger that I'll be having this evening. Thought you'd all like to know. If you want the complete recipe, shoot me a message.