Tiki Tower

Please visit TikiTower if you can. If you see something you like, buy it!!  I did.  I get no kickbacks from Robert but I sure got a kick out of the artwork he did, mounted on a solid slab of wood all tiki style.  "Cosmo at the Moon Palace" is going up on the wall as soon as I get home from work (night shift boo hiss).  

His artwork is digital, put down one layer at a time from the background to the foreground.  Very cool stuff and a very cool process.

I'd love my backyard to look like this one day although I probably won't have the chimp and snake! Eeeek!!  Now if we can just get a hybrid palm tree to survive Nebraska winters I'll be set.

Sunshine on my shoulder, WOULD make me happy....

Talk about your Seattle like weather today. I thought it was supposed to be cruddy Saturday but it was beautiful. I hope you got to enjoy the weekend anyway.  Yesterday I worked till noon, forced the family to help me grocery shop, put 2 coats of polyurethane on some baseboard trim that we finally purchased (we've declared 2010, Year of The House).  I'll document the new pre-hung front door when that project happens. I laid in our new hammock for a bit in the sun, very nice and I was almost asleep when either a dog or The Boy ran past and whacked me! All in good fun of course. (Shakes fist in general direction)

Today the missus did her weekend cleaning she likes to do (stress relief). We walked to Coddington Market hardware store and purchased a load of veggies that she then planted in the mist/rain.  If just one of the tomato plants produces well this year, I'll be happy. Should be some garden activity in a few weeks/months.

Had some tasty eats this past week, smoked pork loin (leftovers for pork chili, hat tip to The Dish), low and slow barbecued chicken thighs (a repeat, and much better this time) and spicy grilled pork and mango kebabs.  The kebabs were the winner, dry rub of chili powder, cumin, oregano, granulated garlic.  Toss the cubed pork with olive oil, them sprinkle the rub on and toss well again.  Getting decent mango chunks proved tougher than expected as my mangoes were too ripe, dang good but too ripe.  The fruit wanted to fall apart on the grill but turned out really tasty.  Have to try that one again soon.  The final dish was served with a reduction of orange and lime juices, some honey and a bit of salt. 

Yes, I eat a lot of broccoli!

Have a great week everybody!

Happy Mothers Day!

To all the Mothers out there today, I hope you have a wonderful day.  To Mindy, Bonnie, Ginger and Cheryl, we love you here at the West A House! And the Boy and I will be thinking about you all day.  You are our Sun and we revolve around you. Thank you for all you do for us every day of the year not just today.

Now on to the food!

Roasting carrots and brussel sprouts in the rain, pork chops and roasted asparagus, Cinco de Mayo shredded chicken soft tacos, Angus steak with roasted new potatoes, baby button mushrooms and Vidalia onions, shrimp sate and sticky rice.

I hope you're all enjoying spring so far (except for that blasted wind).  The tulips are pretty much gone but the Iris are opening and the lillies are getting ready to pop.  All the cold crops are doing well in the garden, onions, mixed greens and peas. 

Spring has Sprung!

So I've been really busy at work and in the evenings the last couple of weeks.  Lots and lots of yard work with everything growing and sprouting and turning green again.  Sadly our American Willow had three large trunks develop rot from ants and they came down the other day in the 40 mph wind gusts. 

I've kept the Tiki flame burning brightly this spring with the arrival of Jeff "Beachbum" Berry's newest book last month.  I've been waiting for my copy since I ordered it last August.  I greedily tore open the package and the book opened upon the brand new South Pacific Punch recipe (see bottom) so I made two to christen the book!!  Delicious!  I can hardly wait to explore this book from cover to cover.

I will be back to blogging food and beverage very soon loyal reader!  I have to tell you that the other day I grilled some chicken with a simple lemon-mustard glaze and roasted some asparagus spears in a veggie basket on the grille at the same time.  The spears were just tossed with olive oil and cooked up very nice.
Anyway, my creative wife took some leftover chicken and some asaparagus and made the most delicous chicken salad I've had in some time.   Along with those she added some chopped red onion and a bit of black pepper and coarse ground mustard.  It was delish!

See you soon!!

South Pacfic Punch
1 oz fresh lime juice
1 oz fresh orange juice
.5 oz passion fruit syrup
.5 oz falernum
2 oz gold Puerto Rican rum
1 oz dark Jamaican rum
shake well with ice, pour unstrained into tall glass, garnish with fresh
mint sprigs  (I used a pineapple leaf since I had no mint that day)

Gai Yang, Thai Barbecue Chicken

Our last trip to Vina and Viet Hao markets didn't produce everything I've been wanting in the kitchen.  So I ordered some Healthy Boy brand sweet soy sauce from Import Food.  If you can't find it in Lincoln, they probably have it.  I ordered quite an assortment of staples and I'm looking forward to some more Thai and Vietnamese dishes.  But not to worry, Vung Tau is still on speed dial!

Last night I made a marinade for the chicken of oyster sauce, sweet soy sauce, garlic, fresh ginger, salt, pepper and satay seasoning from Penzeys.  Rinsed the chicken in cold water, patted it dry with paper towels and put it in a dish deep enough to let the marinade cover it.  Before I poured the marinade on, I rubbed the chicken with lime halves.  The longer you marinate this, the better.  If you're pressed for time, let it sit for at least two hours.

When I got home this evening, I quick thin sliced a cucumber, half a red onion and a whole deseeded jalapeno.  In a bowl went a half cup cider vinegar, sugar and salt.  Whisk this up till the sugar and salt are dissolved and toss in the veggies.  Chill this in the fridge while your grill is heating and while cooking the chicken.  I put the chicken skin side down right over the hot coals for no more than a minute to sear the skin and give it nice grill marks.  Then moved it away from the heat, covered the grill and 40 minutes later it was done.  Serve some sticky rice and sweet chili sauce with this and you'll love it. 

Bún chả giò (Vietnamese for delicious?)

The better half and I have been going to Vung Tau at 27th & Y Street for a while now. They have some of the best food I've ever eaten. It's a local family run restaurant and you're going to go there for the food and not the ambiance! But you really should go, really!

We've talked about the possibilites of making some dishes at home so we read up on the subject and decided to jump in. There are several good places on the internet to do research and thankfully Lincoln has become diverse enough I wasn't worried about finding what we needed. We went to Vina Market and grabbed some goodies to make the dish.

First let's make a sauce called Nuoc mam pha. "Mixed fish sauce" comes with some of the meals we have at Vung Tau and without it, you won't be happy. The basic recipe is this, 1 part lime or lemon juice. (I used lime and 4 tablespoons to set my ratio) 1 part fish sauce. 1 part sugar and 2 parts water. To this I added two teaspoons each of minced garlic and hot pepper flakes.  Heat in a sauce pan on medium high until the sugar dissolves and then cool it in the fridge. 

The main dish consists of coarsely chopped fresh greens, sliced spring onions, bean sprouts, a handful of mint leaves, and sliced cucumber. Over this add some rice noodles (vermicelli), roasted peanuts, roasted or grilled pork, and fried spring rolls.  I spoon the nuoc mam pha right over my bowl so it trickles down over all those good things.

I had a nice pork roast from Leon's hollering at me so I marinated it earlier in the day in hoisin sauce, molasses, brown sugar, minced Bird's eye chili and garlic, red currant jelly and Golden Mountain Sauce. After marinating 6 hours, I slow cooked it over some of that Cowboy charcoal until it was 165 degrees internal temp. 

We love this dish and even "the Boy" ate it!  And I'm thinking about having it for lunch again today!

Have a good week! Stay dry and I pledge to post more for the five of you who still read this!

Bali H'ai May Call You....

Any night, any day, In your heart, you'll hear it call you: "Come away...Come away." Bali Ha'i will whisper in the wind of the sea: "Here am I, your special island! Come to me, come to me!"

I took the better half to South Pacific at the Lied Center Saturday. It wrapped up her birthday which was earlier this month. If you got the Journal Star last Sunday the 21st, she was the one in the cute pink dress on the cover of the Celebrate section.

South Pacific was great. Great cast, great vocals, great production. It was a thorougly enjoyable performance and the three hours went by fast. I sat there looking at the set with the huge palm tree and rolling beach dunes and the island Bali H'ai in the distance. Really had a longing to get to French Polynesia soon.

Photos Courtesy of http://www.southpacificontour.com/