Eating in General

Last fall, I wrote an article about cooking for my column ("Surviving Japan") in the AFWJ Journal. It has not been published yet because the editor misplaced it and neglected it to to put it in the December issue, so I am hoping it makes it in the February issue. Anyway, Deenster wrote about this topic on her blog recently, and I thought I would comment, but I had been considering writing about some of my recent discoveries regarding cooking. This is a topic I never tire of!

In my article, I focused on the evolution of my cooking repertoire and attitude especially in relation to a picky/critical Japanese husband. To be honest, it took me a long time to get to the point where I could actually write about it because I was so hyper-sensitive about the topic of cooking. So, in the article, I talked about my attitude towards cooking, being that I cook what I want to cook, and if Suk wants something in particular, he can make it on Sunday nights, which is traditionally HIS night to cook. (Or we can go to his mom's for dinner where she will cook whatever he requests.) Having a child has sort of lead to my appreciation of cooking much more though. Now, I want to challenge myself more because I have someone to cook for. Okay, okay, she can't eat most of the things I make, but for now, I am just in practice mode. I have tried the slow-cooker thing, but Suk hated almost everything that was made the slow cooker. I thought he was crazy, but my best friend (Shannon) admitted to hating slow cooker food as well. Guess he is not so crazy after all. So, then, I thought casseroles would be the way to go, especially in winter. However, casseroles are not so trendy these days. I did manage to procure a Casserole Cookbook from my grandma over the winter break. It was published in 1965 and is a collection of favorite recipes from Home Ec teachers. Well, if any of you can remember what Home Ec class was like in junior high, you might not want a book of recipes that your teacher recommended - no offense to anyone. And, since I am going back to work in a couple weeks, I too have been struck with the dilemma of what to cook quickly when I get home from work and still be able to hang out with my daughter, and also what can be prepared in advance. After some research and deliberation (and discussion with Suk about how best to carry this plan out.), I came up with the following:

I recently purchased the book "Saving Dinner" by one of the women who works for Flylady. I do not follow all of flylady's principles, but I was interested in some of her organizational tips, as well as this book. This book offers weekly menu plans for an entire year along with shopping lists for each week. The menu plans are seasonal based, so when you start using the book, begin in the season you are currently in. That way, the veggies you go to shop for are all in season. There are only 6 entrees per week as I think the author assumes that you go out to eat or order in at least once a week, or you have a special family recipe you would rather cook. Anyway, the beauty of it is the shopping list makes it easy for you to do all the shopping at once, and the recipes are very easy and they taste great!!!! If you had time, you could make menus and shopping lists yourself, which brings me to my next point.

Suk would probably not be happy (and it wouldn't be economical) if we ate American food every night for an entire year. So, I decided to alternate between American and Japanese. So, one week, I use the Saving Dinner book and the next week, I plan a menu of all Japanese foods. There are plenty of easy Japanese recipes out there - grilled fish, udon with store-bought tempura, braised chicken, etc. Nowadays, many things are ready-made such as the veggie mix for the braised chicken recipe.

After two weeks on this new shopping/cooking plan, here are my thoughts:
The Saving Dinner cookbook offers easy recipes that do not require tons of ingredients (my pet peeve) and are quite tasty. They work great as leftovers or for lunch the next day. Many of the recipes include some veggies within the main entree, which to you means "one-pot cooking." That is every busy person's dream, but they do suggest side dishes that you can serve as well - steamed veggies, salads, rolls. All very very simple side dishes, however if you don't have time to prepare that stuff, no one will miss it!! One thing that might help make things go quicker would be to get a food processor. Look over the recipes on Sunday night, and prep as much as possible ahead of time. For example, this week, every recipe required at least one diced onion. I would have liked to have diced all those onions at once so that I could just use them as I needed them. Also, prepping the veggies for steaming or for salads would have been nice. Then, I could have just thrown a few in the steamer or into a salad bowl while cooking the entree. Instead, this week, I just went without side dishes because I didn't have time to prepare them. To be honest though, we didn't feel like we were missing out. Dinners during the week don't really require all the bells and whistles, do they?

Cooking Japanese food was not so bad last week. I think only two of the recipes I used were brand new to me, and according to my "always-tell-the-truth-no-matter-what" husband, they turned out perfectly. I had purchased a "Basic Japanese Cooking" book in Japanese, and just used the photos to guide me along. I can read about 80% of the Japanese, so when I came across something I wasn't sure about, I just improvised. No big deal at all, and I was happy with everything.

In terms of making things that Ailin could eat, she wasn't able to try everything, but most of the Japanese food was okay for her. I let her try some of the American food from Saving dinner as well, but I still had to give her supplemental "just-for-Ailin" food.

One reason I am really excited about my new cooking plan is that I have finally started to lose weight since beginning it. Also, I am no longer drinking coke and that might have something to do with it, but losing weight only motivates me more to keep up with this cooking plan.

On Sunday nights, my husband is still in charge of cooking, and we usually go out to eat for one other meal on the weekends - lunch or Saturday dinner. Or, if I feel inspired and I offer (but only when I offer, there is never pressure from Suk) to cook on Saturday nights, I will make something extra special because that is the only time Suk can eat my cooking hot and fresh.