January 19, 2014

  • It's like a Top Chef challenge

    So the apartment has a full-kitchen. I was really excited about having an apartment with a full kitchen for a whole week ON THE WEST COAST!! You know there's gonna be a lot of seafood cooked in this apartment. But after having cooked my first dinner here, I gotta say, it's quite the challenge.

    Full kitchen!! Yay!!!

    First, there obviously isn't a stocked pantry. All I have at my disposal are two little salt and pepper shakers, and few bags of sugar that are actually for coffee (but I used one bag in tonight's meal). So when I went to The Market on Yates, I had to also pick up real salt (I bought I nice oak smoked salt), garlic, shallots, etc...not just the main things I wanted to cook. The funny thing is when we got back to the apartment and I started to prep the food, I realized I FORGOT TO BUY THE BACON!!! I wasn't planning on buying a cooking oil because I was just going to cook the fish in bacon fat.

    Luckily, Chinatown is really close by so we walked over and picked up some canola oil. While we were there, we also got some legit Asian instant noodles. Because you never know when you're going to need instant noodles. And since we could, we bought some fresh rice noodles and soya sauce.

    $0.69 for the Mama noodles, and only $0.39 for the Nissin Black Garlic noodles. Damned good stuff.

    Back to dinner. So at The Market on Yates, I wanted to find a fresh fish that I can't easily get at home. I will go to the The Fish Store sometime this week, but it was already closed by the time we went shopping so I had to settle for the selection at The Market. The only fish I didn't recognize was the grey cod. The lady at the fish counter was nice enough to show me each piece I asked to see and then agreed to cut a piece for me when I indicated that they were all too big. This $8 piece of fish should be enough for both my mom and me. I then picked up some Brussels sprouts and grape tomatoes as the side.

    I didn't have any red wine vinegar, so I bought grape tomatoes. Honestly, this dish could've used a bit of bacon. I really wish I hadn't forgotten to buy bacon.

    Do you know how challenging it is to cook with *only* serrated knives and a non-functioning hood fan? Especially with a heat-activated sprinkler head RIGHT ABOUT YOU? Let's just say there was a lot of me walking out to the balcony with a screaming hot, stainless steel pan because I didn't want to flood the unit. I'm sure the people in the back alley were wondering what the hell I was doing, standing on the fire escape, flipping sizzling rice noodles.

    If that wasn't bad enough, I didn't realize that we didn't have any paper towels in the unit. But luckily, I still had a pack of utensils from my Air Canada flight, so I opened it, took out the napkin and made do with that to dry the fillet.

    And the knives? They're all serrated. ALL OF THEM. Mincing garlic, dicing shallots...even halving Brussels sprouts... SUCH A CHALLENGE!! It was like a Top Chef challenge, on Guy's Grocery Games. Improper tools, less than perfect cooking environment, and limited (non-existent) pantry.

    Anyway, I'm not posting a recipe since it really was a make-it-up-as-I-go-along type of affair. But my mom (who is so damned picky) really enjoyed it...and more importantly, I didn't set off the smoke detector...so I'm calling it a success. ;-)

    Just looking at it makes me want another piece of fish.

cokeaddict