Holy Moly. I’m writing this super late, as I was totally sick with food poisoning so all of my cooking got kind of crazy.

Tiny kitchen… but I make it work!

I’ve been catching up on iZombie this month during my kitchen potato endeavors. I find all the characters pretty funny, I love crime stories, and I don’t have to pay attention to every detail as I’m cooking.

I was inspired this week by the fact that my local supermarket had mint (first time I’ve seen it at a non-specialty store in my whole time in Taiwan), and the podcast I’ve been listening to 24/7, My Favorite Murder, mentioned some restaurant in LA called Zankou Chicken with to-die-for garlic paste. I f-ing love garlic, so I knew I had to find a copycat recipe and use that as well.

I’m still playing around with the format of these posts, so please be patient with me as I tinker around and figure out what works.

Just a reminder: click on the titles of the recipes to take you to the website where you can make it yourself!

Lunch

#sofresh!!

• Sun-dried Tomato, Spinach and Quinoa Salad from Cookie and Kate

  • This salad was SO GOOD. It calls for spinach, and none was at the market this particular weekend, so I just chose another random green vegetable. The dressing was so good you could seriously use anything you like.

• Tofu skin (Trendy people call it yuba.)

  • I don’t think I’ve seen Yuba in the States, but my hometown doesn’t have a Whole Foods or Trader Joes. I love yuba. I cut it in ribbons and tossed it in soy sauce and nutritional yeast (what?), which is my go-to lazy marinade for tofu. Then I cooked it in the oven.
  • You can substitute any protein you like! Chicken, another tofu, chickpeas, etc…
    

    Here, you can see the tofu skin more clearly

• Extra tip: To prep, I warmed the quinoa/sundried tomato mix and tofu separately, then tossed that together with the greens and dressing. The mix of hot and cold was really good, and helped to wilt the greens a little bit. I also had some carrot lying around, so I shredded that up and added it in.

Dinner

The stinky breath was worth it…

• Pea Falafels from BBC Good Food (with pita bread)

  • These were super easy to make, and I thought it was interesting that they used frozen peas (hey, extra nutrients!)
    

    pre-oven

  • I didn’t fry them. I baked them in the oven (no oil required). They held together well. I usually do about 350F, 15-20 minutes per side.

• Copycat Zankou Chicken Garlic Sauce

  

  GARLIC!!!!

  • This was really good, but REALLY strong. I think the garlic cloves I used were too big. If you are sensitive to garlic, I’d advise you to use a little less, just as a precaution. However, even though it was super strong, I couldn’t stop myself from eating little bits of it plain!
  • If you make my mistake and it’s too strong, put it on top of the falafels (or whatever you’re making) when you re-heat them. That cooks the garlic a little bit and helps mellow out the flavor.

• Greek Salad (me! ha!)

  • Okay folks, super simple. Chop up lettuce, tomato and cucumbers. Toss with some salt and pepper, dried dill and/or oregano, lemon juice, and olive oil.

All in all, it was a good week. I will definitely be making both of these dishes again. Both are great summer dishes, and you really feel your body taking in nutrients from those fresh veggies!