Tomatoes

What can you get for 1 dollar?

For 1 dollar you can get snack size parfait from McDonalds

or KFC chicken snacker

or 5lbs of tomatoes from Zion Market!!

This last Monday our secret ingredient was tomato!

We started out with a tomato, iceburg lettuce salad, with tofu, and bacon bits. For dressing, we had a ginger miso. A light tasing meal to opn up palate... screw amuse bouchee.. we're under a $25 budget!

Now... remember that meal that your granny prepared for you when you were young... ok mine was rice with more rice and fish sauce.. but I'm a fob... if I was that rich white kid down the street it would have been tomato soup and grilled cheese... and to relive and recreate my childhood, our second course was just that... vegetable stock tomato soup with grilled cheese made with 7 grain bread and two types of cheese...

our third course was roasted tomato stuffed with salmon and sundried tomato. I was quite proud of this dish as it came to be in a vision...that or Zion supermarket sales ad.. .eh toe-ma-toe toe-mah-toe :)

By this time we were lycopene'd out! So to alleviate that, I decided on a panna cotta hold the tomato juice for dessert... This was surprisingly good.. but being calories conscious... we will try fat free and half-half next time!

Last but not least.. I want to take this time to thank our special Gus Gus for making this meal even more memorable and tasty by providing us with an extremely delicious beverage... vodka with clamato juice, orange and lime and soda. GREAT JOB GUS GUS!

P.S. Sorry for the fobby posting... I'm currently in Vietnam... so there's no fob check.. but foblish or not...

Cheers!

- Monday Supper Club

Corn

Seriously who doesn't love corn? This past Monday, corn was our Monday Supper Club secret ingredient and I have to say it was another success.

We first started off with the Corn Bread with kernels inside. This was surprisingly tasty, although we should have probably put it in the oven with higher temperature to achieve that gold brown finish on top.



Our second dish was the corn chowder. Our broth was made out of vegetable stocks (celery and onions) and contained chunks of potato and bacon. The cream acted as a thickening agent. Naturally, this was another success although we later thought it would have been even better if we had saved some of the bacon later to sprinkle on top, that and some green onions.



Our third dish (oh my by this time I was quite full) was corn souffle. I was asked by one of the Monday Supper Club members the meaning of the word souffle. Basically, what makes something a souffle? According to wikipedia (my trusted source for everything) the word souffle is a past participle of the french verb souffler which means to blow up. Ahh the french, always make everything seems so elegant. Over hear, anything that is blown up will be either terrorist or fat! Anyway, I digressed the souffle had a nice golden brown top, unfortunately it didn't really rise since the oven was opened. between the egg whites and the cream of corn, the souffle was slightly sweet. Next time I would put in some cheese and bacon into the mixture so it would be corny and cheesy. Har har.. Lesson learned though, leave the oven alone if the souffle is already in.




Q: So why is it that you should not make dinner plans with corn?
A: Because corn flakes!

Sorry I couldn't resist... I had to go through a maize of jokes just to find that one.. .Maize.. get it? Anyway, for dessert we made blueberries cornflakes parfait. It was a nice light treat and I also learned that it sucks to be a single man. All that beating for that amount of frothy cream... not worth it :P Our cornflakes parfait consisted of layer of cornflakes on top of fresh beaten whipped cream and then blueberries sauce and repeat 1 more time.



The entire meal cost less than $30... Enjoy!

Cheers,

- The Monday Supper Club

Oranges

Knock Knock...
Who's There?
Banana
Banana Who?
Knock Knock...
Who's There?
Banana
Banana Who?
Knock Knock
Who's There?
Orange!

Yes.. Yes.. my friend I can get quite corny, but this week our secret ingredient was Orange!

We started off with the Inari - Bean curd stuffed with rice that was drizzled with orange juice and vinegar. Quite delectable and rather refreshing.

Second dish was orange cabbage onion salad. Sauteed onion and cabbage topped with oranges and drizzled with a balsamic vinagrette with of course orange juice.

The piece de resistance was the baby back ribs, slow cooked for 6 hours in KBBQ sauce (picked out by yours truly) with oranges! This was amazingly delicious, perfect outside and soft come right off the bones inside. (see picture at the end)

For the dessert, we had orange souffle. Although I have an inkling that our group would have been satisfied with the Orange Liqueur as dessert. :) This was of course made with orange zest, orange juice, orange liqueur, grand marnier with homemade whipped cream! DELISH!

It's quite a shame that we did not take pictures of the other dishes but here is the picture of the baby back ribs...



I want my baby back baby back ribs...
I want my baby back baby back ribs...

Chilli's!

Ok ok I'll stop being corny.. until next week when our secret ingredient will be... are you ready? Are you?!?! CORN! *rim shot* Yes yes... I'll be here all night.. or until 5 PM whatever comes first...

Who we are...

Hello friends...


This is the beginning of our journey toward love, life, friendship and of course food! Once a week, you may be the lucky guest to get the exclusive seat at 12141 Chez Centralia. Be forewarned that you need to come prepare to cook, eat, and laugh. This blog will be used to document our culinary experience. That and I am bored and love blogging on your tax dollars! :)

Cheers,

The Monday Supper Club