Friday, May 7, 2010

Finger Lick'n Friday

I’ve finally decided to follow in the footsteps of some of the more ingenious and organized bloggers around and divide up the week by theme.  Because just posting off the top of my head is not always easy.  And frankly, I’m just not clever enough to come up with something on a daily basis. 

So, Friday’s before the weekends kick off I’m going to devote my posts to another of my passions- food. 
My mom was a great cook and I grew up loving food.  I was not a picky eater and I’ll still try just about anything.  (Except things that smell like poop.  I live in France, and there are seriously foods that smell like poop.  I won’t touch them.) 
You know how they say when you move out, you learn to cook like your mother and when you get married, you gotta learn how to cook like your mother in law?
That’s kind of what I went through when I moved to France.  There are no ‘boxed meals’ here- no mac’n’cheese, no stovetop stuffing, or canned soups.  I had to basically throw all my American traditions out the window and learn how to cook using the basics.
My mother in law bought me a pressure cooker which is what she uses to make the big family meals and I discovered a whole new world of ‘boeuf bourguignon and poulet aux olives’.  When I was a ‘sahm’, I spent umpteen hours a day watching ‘cuisine tv’ and took up making my own breads and pizza doughs.  Cooking relaxed me and it was fun.
Now, after a few years of cooking with raw ingredients, I was in for an extreme culture shock when I came back to the US and tried to go shopping for the first time.
It took me twenty minutes to find plain couscous.  And when I asked the very ‘suthern’ staff at Publix where to find it- they looked at me like I had three heads.  ‘Coooos cooos?  I dunno.’  ‘Nuff said.  I ended up going to Whole Food and the Fresh Market because it was the only way I could shop without having a panic attack or needing an inhaler. 
Today’s post isn’t going to be devoted to some elaborate French cuisine.  I had a question from Susan Fields about one of my favorite snack foods-  Chinese Souffléd Shrimp Chips.
I don’t know how they’re made and frankly, I don’t want to know.  But they are crunchy, sweet, shrimpy goodness and I recommend them for one and for all. 

Happy Friday Everyone!

26 comments:

Clara said...

Hummm, strange food! I always like to try it. I once saw that in china they eat caramel insects, and I thought it could be yummy. Yep, there´s something seriously wrong with me.

BTW, u won an award on my bloog, Happy mothers day!

Vicki Rocho said...

my fantastic sister in law runs a daycare and says the kids LOVE couscous. Even my daughter (8) loves it but I have yet to try it. If you've got a recipe for it, do share...it's time I got off my booty and tried something else.

Avo said...

What french food could you be thinking of that smells like excrement? Maroilles? Boulette d'Avesnes? It has to be cheese, I can't think of anything else foul smelling that they eat here... Ohhh, are you in Normandy? Did you get exposed to Chaudin?! It doesn't always smell that bad! Normaly if it is cleaned properly it doesn't smell at all! Even less so if it soaked in milk.
Borgignion? ; j Teehihi.

Slamdunk said...

Yeah pressure cookers. They get used often here as well.

Happy weekend.

Matthew MacNish said...

Hah! I've never heard that saying but I'm sure that's true. I do the cooking in our house so that doesn't really apply to us but I love to cook and try new things.

Sounds like a great new scheduled topic for Fridays, thanks for sharing Katie.

Today's guest bloggers are Lisa and Laura Roecker!

Unknown said...

You used my least favorite phrase ever!!! I can't stand thought of people licking their fingers so the minute I saw the title I cringed *shudder*

Good thing I saw your name after or I wouldn't have stopped by, LOL

Creepy Query Girl said...

Alesa- I was thinking of certain cheeses but especially- L'andouille. OMG! it smells like butt. I don't know about you but it's like my nose say 'warning! Warning! This smells like bunghole. Do not eat. I repeat. Do not eat.' I guess most french don't have that inner odor detector.

Creepy Query Girl said...

Jen- I'm sorry i'm going to be cringing you out on fridays. I get the mental image too- like people with buffolo wings and sauce all over their faces. It's messy. Like my posts;)

Avo said...

I love andouille, andouillette, tripes à la mode de caen, mortadelle, and pretty much any cheese you can think of.

Cheeses are supposed to be smelly... and it's rare that they taste as strong as they smell (also that is not specific to France, they have some right stinkers in the UK too for instance). Maroilles melted and cooked in puff pastry! Delicious and really not that strong...
Have you ever had and/or smelled durian? Now there's a stinky fruit! Some people say it smells of cheese, other say it smells of rotting corpses... It's tasty though. : j

Inner odor detector? lol. It's just a matter of cultural conditioning...

I wish I could invite you over and cook for you. That way I'd be sure you had gotten a fair chance of appreciating this things. Often the smell and the taste of things are surprisingly different.
Then again, maybe you simply don't like them...

Jaydee Morgan said...

Remind me never to move to France. I have enough trouble boiling the water to make Mac & Cheese. Having to cook from scratch would mean we'd starve.

Strangely enough, though, now I have a craving for KFC.

Avo said...

@Jaydee: Never move to France... ; j
Joking set aside, there's a lot of pre-prepared stuff here too. And cooking from scratch isn't half as hard as it is made out to be.

Laura Pauling said...

Learning to cook from scratch is a great thing and a lost art in America! I'm still figuring out posting and themes. But I'll get there. I'm still in the discovery stage about posting and what I like to post about vs. what draws the most readers. I'll get there -eventually. :)

mi said...

jaydee - don't worry, they have kfc in france if you ever do move there, haha!

and i totally know what you mean about some of the food smelling like poop. i eat muenster cheese here in the US, but one time in france i made the mistake of ordering toast with muenster cheese.
honestly it smelled like someone farted on my plate. mr. write had to move the toast and cheese to another table so we'd be able to finish the rest of our meal.

Creepy Query Girl said...

jaydee - lol. They Do have KFC here but why french cuisine would you give you a craving for it is beyong me. lol

Alesa- I've tasted andouillet (for just that reason- hoping, praying, that it wouldn't taste like it smelled- but alas) It tastes like it smells. Unless you do like the french and drown it in dijon mustard. I'd love to know your recipes!

mi- lol. I don't know if I've had muenster cheese

Laura- yeah, I still haven't come up with anything for the other days of the week! lol. I'll get there at some point. I hope.

Avo said...

Where did you have it? Andouilette is like chipolata sausages, if you get them at shopi or intermarché (or any other super market) you'll get sub par sausages. Even a lot of charcutiers make sub par sausages/andouillettes.

Chances are you don't like tripe. You're not alone, a lot of french people don't like it either. : j

One thing I like to do with andouillette is to make tomato sauce from fresh tomatoes in one pan (basic pomodoro sauce) while in the other I sautee the gutted andouillette with garlic, hot peppers, and some petits lardons fumés (smoked bacon) til it browns... then I combine the pans, cook down a bit, and serve on japanese rice. It's kind of like tripes à la mode de caen, kinda like hayashi rice, kinda like a bunch of things really... But quite tasty.
And if you're in a hurry, just get a jar of store bought tomato sauce (eg barilla's arabiati is ok, or Panzani's sauce napolitaine) and use that. 15 minutes prep and cooking time.
Since you don't like tripe you can replace the andouillette with pretty much any meat... I'd go with lamb of beef. But lower the amount of hot peppers with the lamb so as not to kill the taste.

Carolyn V. said...

Wow! I'm so impressed. I used to love to cook, but now that I have to do it everyday, I don't like it as much. I should learn to love it again.

Talli Roland said...

You've made me hungry now! I'm so glad you decided to devote a day to food of the non-poop-smelling variety). Rightfully so!

Happy Friday!

Theresa Milstein said...

The shrimp flower looks pretty.

You should read My Life in France by Julia Child. I think you'd appreciate it.

Sherrie Petersen said...

Cooking relaxes me, too. In fact, today I'm making those big soft pretzels for my kids. They freeze well and make a good after school snack. And when I make them from scratch they have whole wheat flour an a LOT less sodium :)

Laura S. said...

Yummm, I love new foods! I'm looking forward to future Finger Lickin' Fridays!!!

Shannon said...

Another foodie! Yay. I'd love to learn some of your recipes. All too often I take the easy route when it comes to cooking. Looking forward to reading more.

Have a great weekend!

Lydia Kang said...

I'm going to like these Friday posts. Yumm, food.
It's so true about the "cook like your MIL" after you get married. I did learn that, but I didn't realize it until I read this post!

Shannon O'Donnell said...

Oh, I am so hungry right now - and I REALLY want one of those shrimp chips! *wipes drool from chin* LOL!

Have a great weekend! :-)

Angie Paxton said...

Yum, posts about food! Looking forward to them.

Lua said...

Great idea for Fridays- food is also a passion of mine but I’m afraid not the cooking part (if you don’t count boiling water as cooking). The eating part, however, I’m utterly passionate about! :)
I just discovered your blog by chance and I’m super happy that I did- I also finished writing my first book and started stalking agents and trying to wrap my mind around the whole query process! :)
Well, happy eating and querying to both of us!

Alexandra said...

Hi. Thought of you and your friday food blog. There is a blog here in the US that blogs on Jaime Oliver and his show with a bunch of other friday food bloggers.

Thought it might interest you. I'll see if I can get the link to you to link up.


http://www.everythingmom.com/articles/free-meal-plans-free-meal-planning.html

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