Anyone who has cooked has had them. Those big failures, flops, disasters! Something that in no way resembled edible food, or at least food that the average person would want to eat. Well, tonight was not the first failure ever, I can't even tell you how many of those I've had, but it was the first one that has happened during my month of Gourmet experiment. I may actually be more prone to these disasters than the average person as I have a tendency to read quickly and not always, completely. That's what I did in this case. I read that I needed tapioca for the Tapioca Pearl Pudding with
Lychees and Mango on page 110 but I was so intent on finding canned
lychees that I neglected to get the right kind of tapioca. Yes, yes, I know now it says "not quick cooking". Well, here's what happens if you use quick cooking tapioca. You will have a large pot of something that can only be described as clear lumpy slime. Without sugar, it actually tastes like nothing. (I tasted it!) With sugar and the fruit, it tastes like sweet, fruity slime. Not exactly appetizing to anyone but ... the girl who refuses to eat perfectly good fish (see previous post).
Eyrleigh loved the fruity slime and I drained most of the slime off so she can finish it for breakfast tomorrow. No point in wasting good mango and
lychee, right?
I don't usually write about the dessert first but for obvious reasons, I reversed the order just for this post. As the meal, I made the Southeast Asian Beef and Rice-Noodle Soup on page 71. Let me begin by saying I often order
pho at local Vietnamese restaurants so I have an expectation of what
pho should taste like. I know that
pho is often quite bland on its own and the
accompaniments liven it up considerably. This
pho was particularly bland in my opinion. It had some heat from the
chilies but no complexity like the Thai-Style Chicken Soup with Basil that I made last week. The
Sriracha and
hoisin helped some but I would have liked a soup that had the ability to stand alone, not one that needed intense doctoring to be enjoyable. I actually thought the meat was a bit too fatty for the soup, there was a gloss to the soup that did not add to the flavor at all and made it feel heavy. All in all, not the best night of the month but sometimes the flops are part of the fun.
Anyone who has cooked has had them. Those big failures, flops, disasters! Something that in no way resembled edible food, or at least food that the average person would want to eat. Well, tonight was not the first failure ever, I can't even tell you how many of those I've had, but it was the first one that has happened during my month of Gourmet experiment. I may actually be more prone to these disasters than the average person as I have a tendency to read quickly and not always, completely. That's what I did in this case. I read that I needed tapioca for the Tapioca Pearl Pudding with Lychees and Mango on page 110 but I was so intent on finding canned lychees that I neglected to get the right kind of tapioca. Yes, yes, I know now it says "not quick cooking". Well, here's what happens if you use quick cooking tapioca. You will have a large pot of something that can only be described as clear lumpy slime. Without sugar, it actually tastes like nothing. (I tasted it!) With sugar and the fruit, it tastes like sweet, fruity slime. Not exactly appetizing to anyone but ... the girl who refuses to eat perfectly good fish (see previous post). Eyrleigh loved the fruity slime and I drained most of the slime off so she can finish it for breakfast tomorrow. No point in wasting good mango and lychee, right?
I don't usually write about the dessert first but for obvious reasons, I reversed the order just for this post. As the meal, I made the Southeast Asian Beef and Rice-Noodle Soup on page 71. Let me begin by saying I often order pho at local Vietnamese restaurants so I have an expectation of what pho should taste like. I know that pho is often quite bland on its own and the accompaniments liven it up considerably. This pho was particularly bland in my opinion. It had some heat from the chilies but no complexity like the Thai-Style Chicken Soup with Basil that I made last week. The Sriracha and hoisin helped some but I would have liked a soup that had the ability to stand alone, not one that needed intense doctoring to be enjoyable. I actually thought the meat was a bit too fatty for the soup, there was a gloss to the soup that did not add to the flavor at all and made it feel heavy. All in all, not the best night of the month but sometimes the flops are part of the fun.
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