Yum, healthy chicken stir fry.  Seriously, I love this stuff.  Anyway, I have these cookbooks and all of them have various types of chicken stir fry.  So I grabbed various ideas from all of them and created my own easy chicken stir fry.

• 1/2 TBSP cornstarch
• 2 tsp chopped ginger (I used the jar of sliced ginger in its own brine)
• 2 tsp minced garlic cloves
• 3 dried chilies, chopped
• 1 tsp sesame oil
• 2 TBSP low salt soy sauce
• 2 chicken breast, sliced thin

Mix together with finely sliced chicken and let marinade for 15 minutes

Then:

• 1 tsp peanut oil
• 1/2 yellow onion, thinly sliced
• 2 tsp of minced garlic
• 1 can of drained baby corn, cut lengthwise and half
• 4 baby bok choy, cut lengthwise and half
• 1/2 TBSP of cornstarch
• 6 TBSP of soy sauce
• 2 TBSP oyster sauce
• 1/4 cup of chicken stock
• 2 TBSP cashews or peanuts (OPT)

With a hot wok, add peanut oil, onion, and garlic.  Add the chicken until it’s almost cooked through.  Add the baby corn and bok choy (until wilted).  Now mix the last four ingredients (soy sauce, corn starch, oyster sauce, and chicken stock) and add to wok.  Stir fry until the sauce has thickened to coating consistency and the chicken is cooked.  

I put them over noodles (yes, spaghetti.  I ran out of rice noodles!).  But you could also use rice instead too.  If you add cashews or peanuts, add to the top of each plate.  Yum!

I have always talked about wanting to go to Bar Louie (menu here) and just went after seeing the Sex and the City movie.  I didn’t realize, until just now, that it’s a bit of a chain!

• Food:I ordered the Baja fish tacos which were pretty good.  The fish was seasoned very well (and not fried, yay!).  The only reason it got a “pretty good” is because the flour tortillas were soggy from the mango salad so it made eating the tacos quite difficult.  However, the mango salsa (with tomato and cilantro) was excellent.  The guacamole was decent.  We also ordered their tater tots after the bartender said that Bar Louie is famous for ‘em.  The same friend who went with me to Bar Louie was with me at Tonic and we concurred that the tots weren’t as good as Tonic because they were cold and not as crispy.  My friend ordered the buffalo chicken and apparently, her food was also cold. 
• Service: Our bartender was a little slow on the service and obviously the kitchen wasn’t exactly on it’s A game.  
• Atmosphere:It’s very spacious and has nice outdoor seating.  It’d be a great place to go with a bunch of friends for a casual night or to watch a game.  Wow, I almost forgot to share.  Their bathroom, when we were there, clearly had a MAJOR problem.  It smelled so badly — I’m sure a back-up happened, but they should really put up a sign or something.  It was foul. 
• Attire: Casual
• Price: $$
• Overall: If you want to meet up with a bunch of friends in Chinatown/Penn Quarter area, I think this is a great alternative to Clyde’s for a few beers and watch a game.  Their food is a bit of a “hit and miss,” but definitely try those fish tacos (but ask for the flour tortillas on the side or something).  I’ll go back and might try those sliders…I do love mini-burgers!

Details:

• Hours: Daily 11 AM-2 AM
• Address: 701 7th Street NW, Washington, DC 20004
• Ph: 202-638-2460

I love naan bread — it’s one of my favorites.  I found this recipe for homemade naan bread in the bread machine and I have to tell you, it’s pretty good and easy.  I mean, it’s not exactly like the real thing because you probably don’t have a tandoor (or at least I don’t).

BTW, 1 lb of flour is 4 cups.  Make sure your baking stone is hot or this won’t work well.  And don’t worry because the dough will not stick to your baking stone. 

You don’t need to knead it before you roll it out.  I found stretching the dough pretty thin worked best.  Also, I didn’t want to have huge naan so I cut the dough into 10-12 chunks and then rolled it out.  It worked out well.

I don’t know what is going on with WordPress, but my photos aren’t centered and it’s driving me nuts.  So my apologizes while the photos are all to the left. 

When WordPress fixes whatever is going on, I’ll make the appropriate changes to the postings. 

My ice cream/yogurt/sorbet machine.  I’m in love and addicted.  I am now starting to eat this for dinner.  It’s healthy right? 

• 1 1/4-1 1/2 cup of plain yogurt
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 4 medium peaches, sliced (you could also puree it if you don’t want the chunks but I liked the chunks)
• 1/4 cup of half and half
• 2 TBSP sugar

For my ice cream machine, I have to put the container in the freezer for 24 hours.  So follow your machine’s instructions.  I throw all this together and then let it mix for 20-30 minutes.  Then I take it out of the container and put into a freezable one.  Then freeze for a few hours so its hard. 

Enjoy!

Peanut butter, chocolate, and butterscotch — what else do you want in a dessert?  What a delicious combination and top it off with the fact that you don’t have to bake it means it’s a perfect summer treat!

Here’s the recipe for no bake chocolate scotcheroos.  I can also imagine this would be a great recipe to do with your kids (or nieces, nephews, cousins, younger children, whatever). 

Today is my Girl Scout Cookie recipe day.  This time, I tried this recipe for thin mint cookies.

To be honest, I didn’t think these really tasted quite like the Girl Scout version (although the photo she included was beautiful). 

The cookie wasn’t really like a wafer as much as it was like a cookie.  And while I am known to sometimes deviate from the recipe, I followed this one exactly.

Oh well.  They were still good cookies!

I used to love the Samoa Girl Scout cookies — they were always my favorite.  When I stumbled across this recipe to make them at home, I had to try it.

Well, mine aren’t pretty but they definitely taste like the Girl scout cookie version. 

Next time, I wouldn’t make my dough so thin.  I had a thought for those of us who don’t have a small donut maker.  What about rolling the dough in waxpaper so it’s a perfect circle?  Then to get the hole in the middle, use a straw through the dough.  Then you can cut the dough into the thickness you desire.  I think that’d work. 

If you try that, let me know how that works.  It’s definitely a great recipe!

I am using several cookbooks so I can learn how to make authentic Asian dishes — and then eventually turn the recipes into my own.

One of my cookbooks had this recipe for stir-fry lamb with mint and chili.   While I wasn’t able to find a recipe that’s identical to the one in my cookbook, I did find this one which was somewhat like it. 

Perhaps a few modifications I’d make would be to increase the oyster sauce amount that’s in the recipe to 1/2 cup and 2 1/2 tsp of fish sauce.  You can also omit the nuroc cham.   

I really loved this dish and it’s incredibe simplicity.  I had rice noodles underneath and it was delicious. 

But whatever you do, for God’s sake, don’t overcook the rice noodles!  Otherwise, they get mushy and really gross. 

I will absolutely be making this again!

UPDATE: I was eating the leftovers and realized it was almost inedible due to the incredibly saltiness…it was the oyster sauce.  So this doesn’t save well if you use 1/2 cup! 

UPDATE II: I made it again but this time with NY strip steak and also modified it with only 2 TBSP of oyster sauce.  Yum.  Not as saucy, but it wasn’t salty when I ate the leftovers!  And yes, those are spaghetti noodles (I ran out of rice noodles). 

I haven’t had Pizza Hut pizza years ago so I can’t really remember what their dough tastes like. 

Why you may ask?  Well, it was four or five years ago when I first moved to the city.  They sent me the wrong pizza and I called to tell them it was wrong.   The person on the other line apologized and said they’d send me the right pizza.  OK, that’s fine.  I didn’t eat any of the wrong pizza and gave it back to the delivery guy once he gave me the right pizza.  The delivery guy then demanded the money for the wrong pizza and the right pizza!  I told him I wasn’t paying because I didn’t eat it and it wasn’t my fault for the pizza mix-up.  When I finally got him out of my doorway, I opened my pizza box starving and saw a disgusting half-cooked doughy pizza.  Hence the reason I haven’t ordered from them again.

However, according to the reviewers of this recipe, it actually does taste like Pizza Hut dough.

I made a rushed version of the pizza because I was running late and needed the dough to be done.  So the dough only rested for about 10 minutes.  I also would have split the dough into two different pies because there was a lot of it!  I also followed the other folk’s suggestions of baking the dough at a higher heat before I put on the toppings.