Neither I or Nicole have any ties to the Asian community except through food. We both love sushi, pho, wontons, spring rolls and just about any Asian dish you can think of. We thought it would be fun to use one of our coveted three days visiting together to not just enjoy this cultural food that is rich in flavor and steeped in tradition, but to prepare it and share it with the For the Love of Food readers.
I have never prepared my own sushi, but Nicole has several times and with her culinary background I assume that somewhere in her classes she must have been taught this art of rolling the rice, fish, and vegetables. I was not so daring as you will see in the videos. I wimped out and used what is called the Sushi Cube. I bought it at Whisk (a fabulous kitchen store in my community). It basically lets you stuff all the items for your sushi inside this little box and presses it into a cute little bit sized cube. Great for creating bite-sized appetizers, making sushi with kids or for a beginner sushi cook like me.
All of us including my husband love fresh spring rolls with a peanut sauce so we were sure to include this on the menu for the evening. We have a video and recipe for the spring rolls and a recipe for the peanut sauce. Get the recipes by clicking the button at the bottom of this blog article.
We also added to the menu two kinds of Asian curry: one yellow and one green. I made both using a special curry mix I found in the cultural market. Much to my surprise, we all liked the yellow curry the best. I wonder if it was because I made that one with the chicken thigh meat that lends its fat to flavor to whatever you’re cooking. The second green curry was made using the chicken breast. I will share a photo of each. We cooked white basmati rice to serve with the curries.
To finish off the meal we stirred up and froze some fabulous ingredients that would become homemade coconut ice-cream. This came together with just three ingredients and we did not use an ice-cream maker. This was simplicity at its best! Truth be told we were so full after the meal we did not eat the ice-cream that night however, but Nicole were sure to eat it for breakfast the next morning. Hey, don’t judge us! It was almost a smoothie. I will include the recipe we used as it was very tasty!
All in all our Asian meal was a success with lots of leftover curry and rice that Rob took to reheat for his work lunch. We also saved a ton of money since going out for a great a sushi lunch can run Nicole and me almost $100. We fed all three of us more than just sushi and had leftovers for Rob’s lunch and our breakfast for much less than $100.00. In addition, I learned how to roll the sushi, we got to spend quality time together and share our recipes and experience with you our readers.