We had a lot of lettuce leftover from the hamburgers, so naturally, we used it for a salad. (Is there anything else you can make with lettuce?) I used to make this kind of salad a lot at home because it was easy, cheap and delicious, so I don’t know why I never tried to make it here. It was still easy and delicious, and kind of cheap.

Anyway, the point is, I had to make the croutons for this salad. Everything (such as the balsamic vinegar and parmesan) can be found at Carrefour, but not croutons. And I love croutons — a lot. I’ll pour an entire bag on a salad. Actually, I pour half the bag and reserve the rest for munching. Luckily, I had most of a baguette on hand, so my clever mind instantly decided that it can’t be that hard to make croutons. They’re just over-toasted bread cubes, no?

So I cut my baguette into cubes, tossed them in a bowl with garlic powder and dried sage powder (which I think belonged to one of my old roommates, but I’ve been using ever since I moved in — free stuff!) and a little bit of grated parmesan, then drizzled a little bit of olive oil on them to coat them. I spread them out on my tiny baking sheet and toasted them until they came out like croutons. Tasty! Now I want to experiment with all different kinds of breads and herb spices. Of course, they only make about two different kinds of breads in China, wheat and white. Maybe I can use mantou (steamed rice bread) to make croutons with Chinese characteristics?

Anyway, the salad:

OK, so you can't really tell what's chicken and what's crouton...

Main ingredients: lettuce, chicken, parmesan, croutons.

Special flavorings: balsamic vinegar, olive oil.

Total cost: about 25 RMB ($3.69). A liter of the cheapest evoo is something like 70 kuai ($10.32), and most of what I see in the supermarket comes from Spain. Balsamic vinegar and parmesan are even more outrageously expensive.

Manly.

My boyfriend got it into his head that he wanted to be like Rocky and eat Rocky hamburgers, which are big manly burgers that clog your arteries just by being thought of. Basically, we made hamburger patties (fried in a pan, not grilled, because we don’t have a grill), then piled on all sorts of things. We had the requisite lettuce and sliced tomatoes, plus onions, bacon, fried eggs, blue cheese, and bad guacamole. Also, I think that everyone should season their hamburger patties with cinnamon and nutmeg. It really adds a subtle twist.

Main ingredients: ground beef, lettuce, tomatoes were readily available. But I had to go to the Western food market for decent (though still not great) hamburger buns, and while I was there, I thought I’d pick up better cheese.

Special flavorings: bacon, eggs and the jar of guacamole also are all easy to find. And now that I have them, we spiced our hamburger patties with nutmeg and cinnamon, which is highly recommended if you want to add an interesting, subtle kick to your hamburgers.

Total cost: 50 — 55 RMB ($8.10) for four hamburgers. Not too bad, considering one of them alone at a restaurant would cost at least 80 kuai ($11.80).

I was in a soup mood, but this gazpacho was a salad. Although, I’ve never had gazpacho as a soup or salad, so what do I care? I thought the recipe looked really interesting, to eat and to make. And then it turned out to be really easy to make and the best salad I’ve ever made. It was the perfect balance between healthy (fresh vegetables!) and unhealthy (eggs and lots of ham!). My boyfriend — who’s now back from Shanghai :) — gobbled it up, although I think he was just really hungry after an 11-hour train ride.

A jumble of goodness!

Main ingredients: Tomatoes, green pepper, proscuitto, eggs. All found at Carrefour.

Special flavorings: The recipe called for Sherry vinegar, which I wasn’t even going to bother to look for. Instead, I substituted rice wine vinegar, which I, like a good Chinese cook, already had.

Total cost: Not more than 30 RMB ($4.41) for two big servings. The proscuitto made up for the bulk of the cost, at 21 RMB ($3.09), for more than the recipe called for.

The weekend is when I have time to try out fun food — things that I actually love to eat. In most cases, it means desserts. Sometimes it means a nice breakfast. This past weekend, it meant pancakes, banananananana pudding and carrot cake!

Blueberry Pancakes

Who needs a box mix?

Main ingredients: flour, milk, eggs, blueberries.

Special flavorings: wildflower honey from Israel, baking powder. Easy to find, but since the Chinese rarely bake, I had to pay $4.41 for the imported stuff. Which only means I’ll be baking a lot more now.

Total cost: I’d say about 20 RMB ($2.94), mostly on the blueberries and eggs, for 14 5-inch pancakes, or just enough for Colin and me. For plain pancakes, the total cost would have been about 8 kuai ($1.18).

Banana Pudding!

I miss the South!

Main ingredients: bananas, eggs, milk, sugar, vanilla wafers. I couldn’t be bothered to go to the Western food market (rain + laziness), so I subbed them with these almond shortbread cookies. They turned out to be a dark brown color, so the crumble on top of the pudding looks a bit like dog food :(

Special flavorings: vanilla extract. A 29-milliliter bottle of McCormick’s Pure Vanilla Extract is 55.50 RMB ($8.16).

Total cost: 60-65 RMB ($9) for about six servings. My special banana bowl cost 150 RMB ($22).

Carrot Cake with Orange Frosting (sorry, no picture)

Main ingredients: carrots, flour, confectioner’s sugar, orange.

Special flavorings: baking powder, ground cinnamon, ground ginger, grated nutmeg. I guess the Chinese use ground ginger because that was cheap and came in a small packet. The grated nutmeg, though, came at U.S. prices.

Total cost: About 30-35 RMB ($5) for four mini-bread loaves.

I got the craving for this heart-attack-waiting-to-happen as I was going through my old pictures. It’s a pretty simple recipe, requiring few ingredients and not too much work, either. I tried to make it a little healthier by adding chicken and broccoli. Alas, they were still covered in the alfredo, but what can I say? I love dairy, especially cheese.

A heart attack for this cheesy goodness will (almost) be worth it.

Main ingredients: fettuccine, cream, parmesan; chicken; broccoli.

Special flavorings: red pepper.

Total cost: a lot! About 100 RMB ($14.71) for three servings, plus extra alfredo sauce and half a box of fettuccine.

If you are what you eat, then would that make me really good? Everything I eat is really good.

A craving for potato pancakes snuck up on me earlier in the week, so we finally made some last night. What goes with potato pancakes? We ended up just getting pork, sauteing them in bite-sized pieces.

All in all, a pretty cheap meal that was made more expensive by the lack of local bulk potatoes. We ended up having to buy the pre-packaged kind.

You see, in China, they have about three different kinds of the same item, each with a different price point. Not being well-versed in Chinese, I have no idea what the differences between each kind, except that one (the cheapest) is “regular,” the more expensive (usually pre-packaged in a small tray and plastic wrap) kind is organic and the most expensive is … more organic? Needless to say, the pre-packaged produce usually looks a little nicer, but are sometimes five times the price of the regular, pick-what-you-want kind. It usually isn’t worth it. For example, I have gotten a bag of regular potatoes for less than 1 kuai (15 cents); the special potatoes I got for these pancakes — four of them — cost about 12 kuai ($1.76). In other words, this dinner could have been much cheaper.

Pork on the left, potato on the right.

Main ingredients: pork, potatoes.

Special flavorings: sour cream accompaniment.

Total cost: 25 RMB ($3.68) for two servings of pork and 12 potato pancakes.

We made chicken and rice flavored with curry and orange juice for dinner last night, an easy recipe to get us back into cooking mode following a long weekend of eating out. I’ve never had it before, despite it being a pretty common dish anywhere in the world. Needless to say, I’ve never made it before, either. Cooking rice in something other than a rice cooker? Weird! But the dish was really easy to make, despite taking a relatively long time to cook. And the ingredients were easy to get. Added bonus: it’s a pretty healthy and well-rounded meal!

After I get cooking down, I'll tackle presentation.

Main ingredients: chicken, rice. Both easily and cheaply bought, since the Chinese eat both in rather large quantities. We threw in some carrots, as well.

Special flavorings: curry powder, orange juice. Ditto.

Total cost: 20-25 RMB ($3.50) for four servings. The chicken accounted for about one-third to one-half of the total.

So I’m slowly getting back into the cooking/eating mood. My boyfriend recently moved in with me, and I’ve been having fun playing house. This has led me to try to build up a library of recipes that I can make without too much hassle. The caveat: China.

We’re not very picky eaters, but we do miss our Western dishes a lot. Also, I’ve not had much experience cooking Asian cuisine, aside from chao fan, chao mian and mostly just things that can be chao‘d (i.e., stir-fried).

Thus, the things we can make have been constrained by: (more…)