Affordable Luxury, Pt. 1: Life ain't bad so long as I can eat this well.

I came home late from work tonight, hungry.  So very hungry.  I wanted something simple, something that would not require a ton of prep or even thinking.  I literally rustled all the ingredients for this meal from my fridge/cupboard:

The Salad:

- Spring mix from Milk Pail Market
- Red-gold heirloom tomato (on its last legs) from Berkeley Bowl
- Real buffalo mozzarella (as in, made from buffalo milk) from Trader Joe's
- Home-grown basil leaves
- Handful of toasted pine nuts from TJ's
- Prosciutto from TJ's, torn into little bits
- Bits of red onion from Mollie Stone's
- Extra-virgin olive oil
- Balsamic vinegar

In my humble opinion, one ought to keep a pack of prosciutto around at all times.  It is oh-so-delicious, adds flavor to anything (my favorite is wrapping it around avocado!), and a little goes a long way.  Also, everyone ought to grow a pot or two of their favorite herbs.

The Scramble:

- Shredded chicken from Safeway (I bought a whole chicken and boiled it last night to make stock to put in porridge because Garry was sick...again!)
- Sliced mushrooms from Milk Pail
- Red onion
- Crumbled gorgonzola cheese from TJ's (I store it in my freezer)
- Salt and pepper
- 2 eggs, of course, from TJ's

I dumped the scramble onto some leftover brown rice.  Such a small way to feel like you are livin' large.
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3 responses
OMG Steph. You and I are like, from the same womb or something. I whole-heartedly agree about having proscuitto on hand at all times----that's something we've ALWAYS had in our fridge in our 1+ years of marriage thus far!!! Comes in soooo handy. We throw it on pizza, sandwiches, etc. Then, I read your luxury part 2 post----WE HAVE THAT SAME KITCHEN RACK!!!!!!!!!! It's installed over our sink so I actually use it for quasi-drying rack, too. And then I hang like, my measuring cups and teaspoons and oven mitts from it. Great minds think alike, I guess! ;)
— jean
Oh and one more random thing. I saw your gchat post about boiling a chicken---I literally just made chicken stock on Monday, too!!!!!!! I roasted two chickens for dinner on Sunday night (had my family over), and then made stock the next day. I froze the stock for future use, but I want to know how you make your jook/congee. I want to try that too! That's one thing I haven't cooked yet!
— jean
Haha - oh Jean, congee is super easy to make.  You can make it either in your rice cooker or on the stove top (I prefer stove top so I can watch it more closely).  To note, you will usually use less rice than you expect to use (or end up with more congee than you intended).  I guess I start with a ratio of 1c. rice to 2-3c. water or broth (depends how thick/thin you want it - I like mine a bit on the thin side like they do at restaurants).  Just set on the stove, heat to boiling, then turn heat down so that it simmers.  Stir occasionally in case it sticks to the bottom.  You'll know it's done when the individual grains of rice fall apart and the whole mixture turns creamy, usually about 20-30 min. or more.  Keep adding liquid as necessary until you reach the desired consistency.
Couple things to note:
  • When I'm sick with stomach issues, my mom used to make me a simple congee of carrots and plain rice (just add a bit of salt).  This round, Garry was coming down with a cold so I used home-made chicken broth and threw in the cooked shredded chicken at the last minute, but cooked the carrots for much longer so they were nice and soft.
  • Since this was going to be Chinese-style broth, I boiled the chickens with ginger, garlic and scallions.
  • Use long-grain white rice.  Sometimes we make porridge with short grain rice and it's never as good - comes out kind of lumpy and always too thick.
  • My two favorite traditional congee extras are 1) sliced white white fish and 2) ground pork + thousand year old egg + pickled stuffs, including that chili-tofu stuff that comes in a jar.
  • However, one of the yummiest non-traditional combinations I discovered recently are--get this--yellow corn kernals (cooked with the rice) and crumbled bacon on top!  I'm sure SPAM would taste awesome, too.
Enjoy!
— Stephanie Lim
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