Fast food

So I went back to the doctor and he told me the leg was still broken but mending, and that I could start putting some weight on it. Ms. Roboto no longer, I now wear this bright blue neoprene brace that adds a dashing touch of class to every outfit I wear. Geez...
Putting your foot back on the ground after 4 weeks of not doing it feels bizarre and painful. It's like knitting needles going from the bottom of the foot all the way up your knee. It took a while to get used to it, also because the leg is not really there anymore. I mean, it's there, but it's a twig. The muscle atrophied in a hurry. For the first few days, walking, even with the help of crutches, was quite an ordeal. But always better than hopping on one leg. Anyway. So I'm back on two feet. Or four, if you count the crutches that I still very much depend on.

This means that I can cook again. Well, sort of. I still need to use the mise-en-place'ing table and I chop while sitting down so I can save energy for the standing up in front of the stove part. It also helps when the incredible guy is around to hand me things. But I can kind of make my way around the kitchen on one crutch, with allows me one free hand to carry stuff. Of course, no elaborate meals for a while. Albany also turned into the Bahamas in the last month for some reason, with temperatures in the 90s (or 30C and above) so cooking in front of a hot stove hasn't been very appealing, except for today, now a blissful 58F (14C). This gave me the chance to cook one of my favorite types of fast food: soup.

The incredible guy is at SPAC with the Kings, so I was on my own for dinner. Like my dad, I'm a soup fiend. Soup is definitely my comfort food of choice when I'm not feeling well, and if I don't feel well enough to make it the incredible guy will pick up some wonton soup for me from CCK (299 Central Avenue). They have the real deal there, not those doughy, bland, enormous wontons from the take-out places. If you haven't been to CCK yet, go. Please, just go. It's your chance to have real Chinese food in Albany.

Anyway, as always, I digress. Soup is so easy, especially with a few shortcuts around. Not Sandra Lee type shortcuts, please. By the way, is anyone else freaked out about this woman potentially becoming the first lady of the state? Yikes and a half!!

That was my chicken soup dinner in the photo. As for shortcuts: premade good chicken or vegetable stock, market purchased OK as long as it has no MSG or ingredients you can't pronounce. Progresso or Kitchen Basics are decent options. I also had some cooked chicken (grilled chicken breast), and chopped, frozen celery. I always have carrots and onions around. And frozen peas. And fortunately, since we started our garden early, fresh parsley and thyme. And multigrain elbow pasta. Or any kind of pasta you like in soup.

This takes very little effort: cube about 1 cup of cooked chicken, peel and slice 1 carrot, chop a small yellow or white onion, about 1/3 cup, and 1/3 cup chopped celery. I like to sautee everything in butter. Butter?! Yes. Being from the Iberian Peninsula, cooking with butter is almost sacrilegious, but there is something basically comforting about butter and chicken, and it adds great sweetness to the soup. So, melt 1tb of unsalted butter in a stock pot, and when it starts foaming, add onion, carrot and celery and cook until it starts becoming translucent. Sprinkle salt and pepper (I like LOTS of black pepper in chicken soup), add the cooked chicken, peas, stock to cover it all generously, and bring to a boil. Once it starts to boil, add the pasta (1/2 cup, approx) and about 1/4 cup frozen peas. Also, a couple of sprigs of fresh thyme if you have it, pick the leaves and add to the soup. And 1-2 tb chopped, fresh parsley. Simmer for 10 more minutes. Test for salt, you may need to add more.
Yes, I know, I know, it's just chicken soup. But I'm just trying to make a point that this is a fast, much better option than resorting to the old can of soup, which generally tastes horrible and is pretty unhealthy (check the sodium and preservative content, please). Anything you cook at home will be better than something that came from a food processing plant.

By the way, I was listening to Amelie-les-Crayons while making dinner. I'm still listening to her, actually. I love her music for cooking and writing. It makes me happy.

Like I said earlier, it has been sweltering in Albany lately. The incredible guy and I like our own version of fast food when it's hot. And we like it cold. The fastest food of them all: raw food. Raw fish and salad. Just make sure you get decent, sushi grade fish and all you have to do is slice it. Doesn't get much easier than that. Of course, a good knife to slice the fish without it turning into mush, which a dull knife will do, helps.

I don't like cooked salmon. I tolerate smoked, but I really prefer it raw, so I never bother cooking it. It has a buttery taste when raw, not fishy at all. I like to slice lemon paper thin, and eat a slice of raw salmon with a small slice of lemon and dunk it all in Ponzu soy sauce. You can find Ponzu sauce at pretty much any grocery store these days, where the soy sauce is. It's really good with fish because it has yuzu, a Japanese citrus, in it, so it has a slight tartness.

I have also been making a lot of spicy tuna tartar. I dice an ahi/yellowfin tuna steak - it's very mild in flavor - dice half an avocado, slice 1 green onion and mix it all with 1tb mayo, 1tsp Sriracha (Thai hot sauce, can also be found pretty much anywhere), or more, depending how spicy you like it, 1 tsp ponzu sauce, and a drizzle of sesame oil (it's very strong, so be careful. Start with a drizzle and add more if you like). And a pinch of salt. Stir to combine, sprinkle with sesame seeds and enjoy. The salad in the photo is a Korean style banchan cucumber side dish, see "On Sallets" post and follow link.

Where I'm from, the ultimate fast food is a bocadillo, of course. Bocadillo is Spanish for sandwich, sort of. But we use crusty bread, like baguette or ciabatta. Slice a good chunk of baguette or a crusty roll lengthwise, toast for a couple of minutes and stuff with your favorite anything. My favorite? Chorizo, naturally.

That glass of rose looks delicious, by the way. And I have some chilled. Over and out.

"Buen vino y sopas hervidas, le alargan al viejo la vida"
(Good wine and boiled soup will lengthen an old man's life) Old Spanish proverb.

Laister arte!