paris adventure!

My boyfriend and I went to Paris to visit his family couple weeks ago - so much fun! It was filled with lots of touristy and family times which included a lot of home cooked meals. I've always wondered what French food consists of and discovered that it's lots of baguettes, steak, pasta, pastries, etc. I love croissants and the boyfriend made sure I had some every morning (they were so fresh and yummy!) :)

we had a plate of croissants and eggs with lardons (taste like ham) almost every morning 

ribs with potatoes, steak, baguettes, carbonara pasta with lardons, and salad

at the concorde

It was pretty hot in Paris so my outfits consisted of summer/maxi dresses, tank tops, and shorts.

One of my favorite highlights of the trip was going to Pont Neuf - where couples from around the world visits to place a locket on the bridge that symbolize their love and throws the key into the river to symbolize eternal love.

We're gonna try to find our locket the next time we visit - hopefully next year. :)

Thanks for reading!

<3, phu

brunch: banh tom

again, with all the traveling we've been doing, we changed it up a bit.  instead of making something, we gave each other the option of either making something, or sharing with you all the brunch we had.  

when i think about brunch, i don't often think about Vietnamese food.  so i thought to myself, if i was having a Vietnamese brunch, what would i eat?  the first thing that comes to mind is chao, porridge, which is probably because i will eat that any time of day.  i then thought about what my mom would make when we got to sleep in a little bit on the weekends.  the first thing that came to mind was banh tom, which is a sweet potato shrimp cake.  so that is exactly what i ordered when i met some friends at Minh's Restaurant in Milpitas, CA

Banh Tom (sorry, we dug in before i could take the picture)

if you'd like to make your own, which i definitely recommend, i found the recipe here on Sea Salt with Food.  This recipe looks exactly how my mom used to make them, the thinly sliced sweet potatoes patties with the shrimp nested in the middle.  a shrimp nest, if you will.  i remember walking into the kitchen and seeing the thin slices of the orange sweet potatoes and shrimp bathing in their batter, as my mom was tending over the hot frying pan.  she made platefuls of these little guys for me and my brothers to chow down on.  she made sure we ate our greens by showing us that we would need to wrap it in lettuce before we ate it.  i miss sitting down with my mom and siblings and enjoying a good home cooked meal.

i hope you try making these yourself, i know i definitely will the next time i get.

thank you for stop by and joining!

<3 roe [a roesy life]

Crab Feed: Coconut Curry Crab

Couple months ago, D mentioned that we had a FLAN member in the Bay Area.  Prior to his arrival we were excitedly talking about having a crab feed and that you'd have to BYOP (Bring Your Own Pot) to cook in.  Okay.. BYOP is really only funny to us :\

After spending our visiting FLAN's gambling winnings on the crab, we proceeded to prepare it two ways.  The first way was D's go to recipe: Chili Crab, and the second was one I adapted from Malaysian Food.  I doubled the recipe and substituted the tumeric, since I didn't have any on hand.  To accompany the crab we had rice, some Ong Choy veggies stir fried in garlic and sesame oil, and a crisp, delicious cole slaw, that perhaps will one day get guest posted here.

Eating crab isn't a very neat/clean thing to do.  Eating Coconut Curry Crab is a hot mess.  Or maybe it's just me.  Growing up, my mom used to always crack my crab for me.  Spolied, maybe.  I like to believe it's because I had 2 big brothers to compete with.  So if I were left to fend on my own, I'd starve.  I used to like it when my mom would crack the crab for me and feed me some nice pieces of that succulent crab.  Just like D did for me that day! These days, I'm learning to get my hands dirty and dig in, and pay it forward, but when I tried to feed BF he would not eat the crab!!  WHY?! WHY would you not take crab that your GF cracked for you and is hand feeding you?!? WHY? I guess hand feeding is not endearing to him as it is to me.

Your turn to try hand feeding someone this fun & tasty crab... or not, just hand feed yourself and share the rest.

{Coconut Curry Crab} serves 4-8

• 4 dungeness crabs, cut into 6 parts (I have the the fish mongerer do this for me)
• 4 red onions, sliced*
• 12 clove garlic*
• 2 inch fresh ginger*
• 8 tbsp vegetable oil
• 1 packet of Vegetarian curry paste
• 3 Tbsp Chili powder
• 4 tsp Tumeric Powder
• 2 cans coconut milk
• 6 cups water
• 2 limes, juices
• salt, to tast
• *items to be grounded or blended together

1. Clean the dungeness crab, take off shell, and cut into 6 parts, if you didn't have the store do this
2. In a food processor or blender (or mortar and pestle), grind onions, garlic and ginger into a paste
3. Add vegetable oil to a hot wok or pot, then add the onion, garlic, ginger paste, stir-fry for about 2-3 mins
4. In a small bowl, combine vegetable curry paste, chili powder and turmeric powder, add a few tbsp of water and mix into a thick paste
5. Add the curry paste to the wok, stir-fry until toasted, you'll be able to see the oil start to ooze from the paste.  Don't burn it!
6. Add coconut milk, water, and season with salt
7. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to a simmer. Stir occasionally until the sauce thickens slightly, about 15-18 mins
8. Add crabs and lime juice. Stir to coat all the crab with sauce.
9. Cover and simmer gently until the crabs turn red.  Be careful not to overcook 
10. Remove crabs from the wok and keep warm, let stand for 15 min (this will held the flavors come together).
11. Serve with some rice.
12. Tie on some bibs, or tuck your napkins in your collar, and get crackin!

Look forward to an easy 'Take Two' recipe that I prepared with the leftover Coconut Curry Crab.

Hope you enjoy crackin' these crabs as much as we did!!

<3, roe