Our kitchen came equipped with an oven, electric stovetop, microwave, dishwasher, and hot pot (and ironically my hot pot is the only appliance that made it in our air shipment... so now I have two hot pots and no coffee maker). I had two mixing bowls, about 3 ziploc sandwich storage containers, 3 oval shaped casserole dishes, a cheese grater, and a colander. For utensils we have the tiniest wooden spoons you've ever seen and a couple of spatulas, and a set of large knives. They also included the worst vegetable peeler and can opener IN THE WORLD. The handle broke off the peeler the second time I tried to use it, and I bet a friend he couldn't open a can of tomato sauce in 2 minutes with the can opener. He quit after about 40 seconds, it was that terrible! So I have purchased new ones. A small price to pay for the convenience of a working can opener and vegetable peeler! I also purchased measuring cups and spoons. Not sure how they expected two engineers to cook without those!
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| Did you know they even made wooden spoons this tiny? They seriously aren't much wider then the paring knife! Sorry the picture is sideways. |
The good news is grocery shopping is relatively easy since the arrival of the Tamimi market earlier this year. Tamimi's is owned (operated?) by Safeway and they have a good variety of American products. Additionally all the food labels are in BOTH english and Arabic! Now what's tricky about shopping at Tamimi's is the selection is not always consistent. Sometimes you can find spinach, once I found arugula, but I think they always have iceberg and romaine. We have valencia oranges from South Africa and a good variety of apples. They import Driscoll's berries (for a steep price!) and even some Annie's salad dressings. Don't buy the local avacados--it's worth the $10/kilo mark up to get the imported ones! The beef from New Zealand is pretty good and they always have a large selection of lamb and veal. They also had this fun display a few weeks ago:
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| Fresh, Local Camel Meat! |
However, there are things that they just don't sell here (besides the obvious pork products and alcohol). The things I've missed the most in my cooking are chicken broth in a carton and vanilla. I'm not sure why they don't sell chicken broth but I know they don't sell vanilla for the alcohol content. They do sell what I think is an imitation vanilla but one look at the mile long ingredients list made me put it back on the shelf. However, I was able to find vanilla beans! And thanks to Alton Brown and his Good Eats episode on Vanilla, I knew what to do with it :) I've also missed things like Red Wine Vinegar and cooking with wine in general. I didn't realize how many recipes I used these for until I didn't have them!
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| Scones I made by scraping vanilla from a pod. YUM. |
When you do find delicacies from home it's best to stock up. They had some organic vegetable broth cartons a few weeks ago so I bought four of them. They were still there this week but I'm guessing they won't be around much longer. I also bought four boxes of Kashi Apple Cinnamon Oatmeal a few weeks ago. Lucy loves eating oatmeal for breakfast and this stuff is really good! They have Blue Bell ice cream right now too, straight from Brenham, TX... if you're willing to pay $14 a carton... and I am. :)
Some other grocery store oddities (for this American) are that milk comes in 2L containers and butter comes in a large 400g block (that's 1.76 Cups) with no measurement markings on it. Next time I buy a block of butter I'm going to have to put my own markings on it! I've done ok guestimating how much to use so far but having some markings will really take off some stress! Once I figured out how to pour milk from the carton without spilling it everywhere I've decided I really like the smaller size. I also found it strange that occasionally you see Kroger brand items, despite this being a Safeway store!
I also find the cheese selection to be really odd. Now they have a nice deli where you can get most cheeses, but only once in the 7 weeks since I've been going to the store here have I seen bagged, shredded cheddar or bagged cheese other than mozzarella. They have an entire 5 ft wall of bagged mozzarella, and one time there was a small section with bagged cheddar, mexican blend, and some string cheese. I was new enough I didn't realize how rare this was so didn't stock up as much as I should have. But that's ok, because I can get a block of cheddar from the deli.
Because chicken broth is truly a staple I can't live without, I've learned how to make my own broth in the crock pot from my friend Heather--it's actually really easy! I've only done it twice since moving here but that's provided me with enough to last awhile. Here's the method:
Ingredients:
Leftover cooked Chicken carcass (I've been using a rotisserie chicken)
Vegetable scraps (celery hearts, scrubbed carrot peels)
A few celery sticks
An onion cut in half
Water
Directions:
Put all ingredients in crock pot, add water to an inch from the top. Cook on low 8-10 hours. Strain, let cool, refrigerate overnight. Skim fat off the top and pour into ice cube trays. Once frozen put in a freezer bag and store.
See, doesn't sound too hard does it! Much thanks to Heather for the recipe because I probably wouldn't have tried to figure that out on my own. The smell was HEAVENLY!
With the chicken meat from the carcass I made this recipe:
Chicken with Potatoes and Mustard Vinaigrette
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| Recipe and photo credit: Realsimple.com |
Mine looked similar, except I had to use Arugula instead of watercress. I would love to make it again but haven't seen an acceptable greens substitute.
I haven't ventured into making a beef broth but I did find a good mushroom/veggie broth recipe that makes a good, hearty substitute for it.
Easy Mushroom Broth
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| Too bad you can't smell this |
The other pantry staple I'm now hooked on making from scratch is bolognese sauce. Partly because I can use carrots, onions and celery in it and then have the leftover veggies and scraps for my broths!
Now my favorite thing I've made since moving here was a recipe I found earlier this week:
Cajun Chicken Pasta
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| Recipe and Photo Credit: Skinnytaste.com |
It was SO good! Go add this to your meal plan for next week right now!
I wish I had taken a picture of my own creation. We subbed snow peas for the mushrooms so mine was a little more colorful :)
Of course despite all the fun cooking adventures, Lucy still prefers peas. Thankfully there is a good selection of frozen peas at Tamimi's!
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| "Lucy peas!" |
I didn't even think about there not being vanilla extract--that would be hard to live without, but I bet the vanilla bean scones were awesome. I'll have to give the crock pot broth a try--when I make my own I freeze it flat in quart-sized baggies and it thaws really fast. So glad you guys are doing well. We think about your often and especially missed you on a trip to Jaycee Park this week!
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