Fish Stick Tacos

I thought I'd share one of our favourite quick and easy meal ideas. This is perfect at the end of the week or on weekends when you don't need leftovers for lunch the next day. There are so many things to love about fish stick tacos: it takes about half an hour to prepare and it isn't a heavy meal. Plus, Howard and I can usually finish everything, meaning there's no waste or leftovers to pack away.

To start, purchase your favourite breaded or battered fish stick brand and follow the baking instructions. I bake around 5-7 fish sticks depending on how hungry we are. The ones we buy take about thirty minutes in the oven, which gives me time to prepare everything else. We also buy large size tortillas.

Garnish #1
1 medium size tomato
1 medium size onion
1 sprig of cilantro

Dice up the tomato and onion.
Keep 3/4 of the tomato and onion in a bowl.
Put the remaining 1/4 of tomato and onions in a blender. Set aside.
Chop up one sprig of cilantro and mix it into the bowl of tomatoes and onions.

Garnish #2
1 mango

This can be optional, but we love the sweet taste of mango with the fish sticks. Dice up the mangoes and set it aside. If you want more sour notes and crunch, don't use ripe mangoes, use firm ones instead (similar to mango salads).

Garnish #3
2 small-medium sized avocados
1 clove of garlic
1 sprig of cilantro
1/4 of diced tomatoes
1/4 of diced onions
1-2 small limes
Salt and pepper to taste

Add the avocados, garlic, cilantro, lime juice, salt, and pepper into the blender with the chopped tomatoes and onions. Pulse until smooth. See how quick and easy that was? Guacamole in under a minute!

Lettuce is also optional, I think as long as you have garnish #1 and #3, the flavours are there to work with the fish stick. But, if you have a bit more time and ingredients on hand, include the mango and lettuce.

You leave all of the mise en place out and warm up the tortillas. When the fish sticks are ready, everyone grabs a plate and piles on the deliciousness. You can even have wedges of lemon out if people want to squeeze some more citrus over their taco creations.

Enjoy!

Backyard Season

Once Labour Day passes, I start feeling wistful. Where did the summer go? What did I do this summer? 

This morning at my bus stop, a father and son was waiting there. I'm assuming it was the boy's first time taking the bus to school. His dad stepped back when the bus arrived and headed home, I guess they knew not to embarrass each other. The boy stepped up and politely asked the bus driver to call out his stop, not knowing that stop announcements were automatic now. Thank goodness I don't have children, watching this big milestone made me want to cry. I miss those first-day-of-school new starts!

We had a great end of August week. My aunts, uncles, and cousins came to visit and we ate. We ate a lot. Chinese food. Vietnamese food. Seafood. Brunch.

We feasted at home, spread out around the house and in the backyard. Howard impressed us all by grilling some steaks.

My brother did the seasoning, grinding the pepper mill with grace (ha ha).

My dad, the backyard farmer, supplies us with so many healthy vegetables to cook with. He grows barrels of Taiwanese lettuce, also known as A-choi.

Not my favourite, but we have plenty of bitter melon hanging about. Check out what's also hanging on the top left corner of the net. *Shudder*

This grassy looking one is a favourite of mine, gau choy or Chinese chives. Chop it up and mix it in egg, dough batter, or in a dumpling and I'm a happy camper.

The bitter melons aren't the only ones hanging out in our backyard. We have sing gua or silk squash too.

Howard loves pickled sher li hon or mustard greens. I always pick this out of my beef noodle soups.

Finally, tomatoes! We don't ever need to buy tomatoes during the fall. We simply can't keep up with them. So now that the cooler weather's creeping in, we'll harvest our vegetables and reminiscence about the good old summer times.

My Pizza

My Pizza: The Easy No-Knead Way to Make Spectacular Pizza at Home
Written by Jim Lahey
With Rick Flaste
Photographs by Squire Fox

ISBN 13: 9780307886156
ISBN 10: 0307886158
Publisher: Clarkson Potter
Hardcover: 192 Pages

This cookbook has been getting so much buzz, I knew I had to get myself a copy. Especially when Bon Appétit featured Jim Lahey's pizza on the cover of their March 2012 issue. Since then, I've been thinking about making pizza at home.

The recipe for his famous no-knead dough is available online, so you must wonder, what else does the cookbook provide? There is only one dough recipe and the rest of the book is dedicated to red sauce pizzas, white sauce pizzas, no sauce pizzas, toppings, toasts, soups, salads, and a small section of desserts. So really, once you have the basic dough down, you can do whatever you like. That's the beauty of pizza right? You can customize with any toppings you wish.

However, inspiration and ideas are sometimes hard to come by, so the cookbook offers great topping combinations. Like his bird's nest pie. I would have never thought of it! Or the honshimeji and guanciale pie. It looks so tasty! The spicy eggplant pie makes my mouth water too!

When I saw Lottie + Doof's post on Friday, I knew I would be making pizza the next day. I'm so glad I read his experience first. Because the dough did get crusty and felt a little dry to me. I made the dough on Friday night for it to be ready for Saturday's lunch. In the morning, I was ecstatic to see that the dough did rise (why I was doubting it?)!

I divided the dough into four balls and did my best to stretch each one out into a pie shape. They are personal sized, which is nice for a group of 3-4. Taking Lottie + Doof's advice, I went with the simpler pizza for the first one. I didn't have a pizza stone (we used to ... but gave it away), but a baking sheet works just as well (according to Jim). The oven was cranked to the highest we've ever set it to. This is how it turned out:

Not bad right?? The first pizza we made is an all time favourite pizza of mine. When I have a pizza craving, the simple margherita is so satisfying. Tomato, mozzarella, and basil.

If you prefer, add the basil after, but I like the basil nice and crisp. Yum, I'm craving pizza again while writing this post.

Howard's pizza is just loaded with goodness. Tomato, mozzarella, three kinds of mushroom, proscuitto, and more mozzarella.

Howard made another one, you didn't expect him to be full after one, did you?! This one has tomato, mozzarella, and three kinds of mushroom. After the oven time, we placed thinly sliced proscuitto on top with arugula. Absolutely delicious.

The last one we made for my parents. I asked my mom what she wanted and she took out a Vietnamese sausage and started slicing it. We also topped it with three kinds of mushroom. Then we added basil after it came out of the oven. My dad loved it.

Make yourself an appetizer to go with the pizzas. This one's not from the book, but inspired from one of our favourite pizza places in Toronto. Here, we kept it simple by assembling some arugula on a plate. Covered a thin slice of toast with goat brie and sprinkled diced green apple all over the plate. Lastly, drizzled on some honey.

If you have time, make your own crostini, if not, use Grissol Melba toast like us.

I'd say if you're a pizza beginner like us, My Pizza is a great introduction. It covers equipment, ingredients, adjusting to oven types, and even serving strategies. Overall a simple and thorough foundation for delicious pizza. Try it and you'll never want to go back to frozen pizza again!