SALT PIG
Lukas and Ellie really hate washing greens. We may be two professional cookbook writers, but when the aprons come off, we eat quesadillas for dinner more often than we might like to admit. Real home cooking is improvisational, intimate, surprising, creative, sometimes mundane, sometimes memorable, and always best when debriefed with a pal. Topics include: dried mushrooms and where to use them, making stock out of arguable trash, the joy of broccoli pancakes, what not to bring to a dinner party, how we really clean our cast iron pans (even when people say not to), gauging the lifelessness of one’s sourdough starter, and a seemingly neverending discussion on how to pronounce fricassee. Join us as we get together to break down the flops, the good enoughs, and the pleasures and hilarity of home kitchen life.
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Elinor Hutton has been a writer, ghostwriter, editor, and publishing and culinary consultant since 2010. She’s worked on more than 25 books to date, including four New York Times bestsellers, most recently as the co-author of Gisele Bündchen’s Nourish. She’s also judged the James Beard awards twice, ran the test kitchen for a meal-kit company, and has worked in book packaging and design.
Lukas Volger is the author of six cookbooks, including Start Simple and Bowl, and has collaborated on numerous other cookbooks, including two New York Times bestsellers. Previously, he co-founded the award-winning queer food journal Jarry, and created a line of premium, fresh, and locally made veggie burgers called Made by Lukas. He lives in Brooklyn. www.lukasvolger.com
SALT PIG
Outside Food
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Welcome to SALT PIG! This week we are talking about eating food outside of home: from the beach to the park, from a car trip to just about every social interaction during COVID. Lukas extolls the virtues of slab sandwiches wrapped in parchment and individual half-pint containers. Ellie makes orzo salad with giardiniera-brine dressing. And we dissect the difference in appeal between a communal trough and a curated sharable spread. (Do you want to share long noodles with anyone??) Plus, hear the genesis story of Lukas’ love affair with oatmeal and one way to get extremely crispy salmon skin.
Discussed in this episode:
- Goodbye Caputo’s…I guess we’ll be making our lard bread at home now.
- Ellie’s Marinated Beans
- Lukas’ Spicy Marinated Butternut Squash
- Lukas’ Beach Linguine
- Snacks For Dinner
Welcome to Salt Pig, where two cookbook writers chat about the ups and downs of actual home kitchen life. What are we talking about this week, Ellie?
SPEAKER_01We're talking about all the food that we pack and cook and bring out of the house. So, like, if we're going on a picnic, if we're going on a beach day, if we're going on a very short ferry ride. Um, we've got a lot of fun ideas and you know how to package it up. Yeah, great packaging ideas. Um, talk about some salad dressing that I make out of some leftover uh jardinero brine. That's a real, a real good thing to bring. Yeah, we got some good ideas.
SPEAKER_00So fun. You can find new and old episodes wherever you listen to podcasts. And check us out on Substack2 at saltpig.substack.com where you can sign up for our newsletter that we're sending out once a week now.
SPEAKER_01Before we get started on today's episode, we just wanted to thank Material Kitchen. This episode was made in part with their support. Um, they're a wonderful kitchenware company.
SPEAKER_00I have got a lot of material kitchen items in my kitchen, and um the one that I wanted to call out is the MK Freeboard. So I know Ellie and I, we've talked about microplastics a little bit, which I'm kind of leery of, though I don't think about it too deeply and whatever. Um, but I have plastic cutting boards and every and they're so handy to use, but in the back of my mind, I'm like, should I be using this? And the MK Freeboard kind of operates like a plastic cutting board, it's very lightweight, it's thin, it's easy to like slot into your kitchen cupboard, but it's made out of plant fibers, so there's really nothing to worry about in terms of the plastic. And then you can just throw it in the dishwasher when it's time to clean it. So I actually use that thing all the time because it's so handy. I really love it.
SPEAKER_01Sounds great. Material Kitchen has very kindly given listeners of SaltPig a promo code. So if you go to Material Kitchen, if you want to buy the MK Freeboard or any of their other kitchen wares, at the end, if you just put in SALTPIG15, um, you will get 15% off. So materialkitchen.com promo code SALTPIG15. Thank you so much, Material Kitchen.
SPEAKER_00Thank you, Material Kitchen. All right, let's get started.
SPEAKER_01So I have some sad news that I think you've also heard about, um, which is concerning this bakery in Carroll Gardens, Caputos. In Brooklyn. In Brooklyn. Yes. That is closing. And I guess I read that it's 124 years old, and it's like it was like the bakery of my childhood and of my adult life, basically. I mean, it's not that close to me anymore, but it's, you know, close enough that the kids and I used to literally like take a hike specifically from where we lived to go there.
SPEAKER_00Is this where you would get the lard bread that you mentioned?
SPEAKER_01Yes, it's where we get the lard bread. And it's it's kind of lard bread's kind of hard to find. Um so it's really Capudos. There's another place in Carroll Gardens where you can get it, which is good, but I'm not quite as loyal to it.
SPEAKER_00So this is this is the area where you grew up?
SPEAKER_01Well, I grew up in Borham Hill. It's all sort of in the vicinity. So it was close to where a lot of my friends lived and close to my elementary school. So close enough by sort of Brooklyn in the 80s standards. Yeah, but it was such a it was such a cool old school place you could only pay cash, and it had these like giant ovens you could see in the back, and 124 years, you said. I know.
SPEAKER_00That's wild. So that would have been basically the turn of the century, yeah. Jeez.
SPEAKER_01I know. It's so sad. And this lard bread, I was thinking um when the kids were in preschool, they had this day that um was like, invite your families to come in like one morning and everybody bring like a food of their culture. Um, so you know, it's Brooklyn, it's a really diverse crowd. So, like, you know, someone from Colombia is bringing some special arepas or something, and someone from Japan is bringing, you know, some Onigiri or whatever. So I was like racking my brain. I was like, what do I bring? But I was like, especially like as a food thing, I've I felt like really quite obligated to come up with something. I was like, we certainly have food traditions. I was also like, I wanted to be sort of transportable and something that like kids will like and all this other stuff. So eventually I literally settled on, I was like, I'll go to Caputo's and I'll buy some lardbread. And that will be like our cultural, our cultural experience for, and I think all the other parents were like, who is this weirdo who is bringing this lard bread? Really? They like went around the circle, and again, everyone's like talking about like you know, their grandparents and all this stuff, and I'm like, Well, I I was like, the kids are second generation Brooklyn born, and this is like I tried to really spin it, and I was like, this is our culture.
SPEAKER_00This is yeah, you're not you're not Italian.
SPEAKER_01I'm not Italian, okay. Um, but I was like, I was like, but it's a Brooklyn institution, and and so it makes sense to me. It made sense to me too, and everyone really liked the lard bread, so that was a treat.
SPEAKER_00That's such a bummer, man. And for 124 years, 100 yeah, 124 years, and you spent your whole I've spent like 20, almost 25 years in New York and Brooklyn. And I'm just constantly remarking on like you just can't ever get too comfortable with anything because it's just a constant change and it's the I don't know, the redefining of neighborhoods. It's it's just been such a fiction it's such a a strong part of my experience of living here. But yeah, it must feel different for you like growing up with some, you know, something like that that really was around.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it does feel that way. I mean, it's especially, you know, there's a few places in Brooklyn. There's like Paisan Los Paisanos, which is like the butcher on Smash Street, there's Sahatis on Atlantic Avenue, like and and maybe Capudos, and there's another bakery like college bakery where people used to get like cupcakes, you know, for your birthday party. And it used to just that used to be the neighborhood, you know, that used to be where people would get their meat or get their spices or get their, you know, so it you used to shop like that in Brooklyn, at least in this part of Brooklyn. And that's just obviously disappearing. So it's so sad somewhere. I know.
SPEAKER_00And just close so suddenly too. They were just like open and then closed with a sign on the door and like no notice, no chance to No notice.
SPEAKER_01I mean, literally I know I saw the sign, it was literally like we're turning the ovens off, and that's that. I haven't even told the kids yet. I'm actually sort of scared too. Because they're in fact, just the other day they were like, We should walk over and get some lard bread, because it is like kind of a long walk for them, but it's like the greatest incentive for them to walk for a long walk, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Uh gosh, I would I don't know what to even say about that. It's such a bummer.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, such a bummer.
SPEAKER_00But that 124 years, that's amazing. I mean on the one hand, it's like what a streak.
SPEAKER_01Totally. And yeah, and I guess, you know, who knows what their story was and if maybe people didn't want to keep it going or I don't know. But it's gotta be a really exhausting line of work, that's for sure.
SPEAKER_00Completely. And then to that transition from that must have been very gradual from like being this staple of people, you know, like every day you go get or every day or two you go get your bread, and then to becoming this sort of like specialty. Specialty landmarkey. This is you know, where people are maybe making a pilgrimage every couple months or something rather than that must be a really hard thing to to weather.
SPEAKER_01Especially something so perishable. Like if you don't sell out your bread, then you've just wasted all this time. I know.
SPEAKER_00Oh, I don't know how bakery in that sense I really do not know how how bakeries do it.
SPEAKER_01I mean, I guess I hope that by four o'clock they're just cleared out, like they've just figured that out, but it seems kind of impossible to have a lot of things.
SPEAKER_00I mean, how can you yeah, exactly. Anyway, picnics and maybe the segue here is that lard bread would be a great thing to add to a picnic basket.
SPEAKER_01That's totally the segue. I mean, it's basically like a complete meal. I mean, it's not a nutritious meal, but it's a meal that will definitely fill you up and you will not have to eat anything for a long time. At least in my my experience. Like going there and buying a loaf and being like, this is gonna be great, and then me and the kids just like finish it before we get home. Then we're all like, ooh. Instead. But uh yeah, perfect picnic food.
SPEAKER_00Um Do you bring if have you brought that on picnics before? Definitely. And do you bring like a serrated knife and have a little cutting board and stuff?
SPEAKER_01Or what what's they just tear off hunks of it like a savage, yeah.
SPEAKER_00I do feel like for picnic food the utensils are what I often like either overthink or underthink. Yes. You know, because like bread is one of those you know, I guess ripping off a baguette is pretty nice, but sometimes you want to like make clean slices.
SPEAKER_01Sometimes you do. Sometimes I feel like I'm overly ambitious about like what sort of how involved the picnic is gonna be. Where I'm like, do we really want to have silverware? And do we well want to like eat out of the same dish, sort of like a trough? You know, like do we then need like separate plates and do we need like because I don't I mean I we actually do probably have a picnic set in our basement. I think I think my dad gave me an old one of his, but but I never want to like have a big like then you're just packing up a bunch of dirty dishes and stuff.
SPEAKER_00I don't go on a lot of like picnic picnics, but I do pack food for like hikes or pack food for the beach or pack food for the car trip or something like that. Yeah. And my strategy is always to have like things portioned out, so it's like pasta salads in like a deli container so that you just kind of pass them around and if you have a fork, you just eat straight out of the vessel.
SPEAKER_01Ah, so everyone's sharing the vessels.
SPEAKER_00No, everybody has their own vessel.
SPEAKER_01Oh, Lucas, this is so you. This sounds so delightful.
SPEAKER_00I don't want to share vessels like when there's sand involved and stuff like that.
SPEAKER_01I know, I know. And there's something it does get really funky to share a vessel. I feel like I end up doing that with like Tom and the kids, and it's like even with Tom and the kids who I like feel like we're basically all just like one organism anyway. I'm like, it's still kind of gross.
SPEAKER_00Well, and especially I mean, one of my favorite things to make for the picnic is this I call it beach linguini. Oh. And it's like a raw, you sort of you know, salt tomatoes and zucchini, and turns it turns into and then um a bunch of olive oil and some garlic, and sort of one of like those no-cooked type tomato sauces. And then you've drawn, you know, the zucchini releases the liquid, and so it becomes kind of like saucy. Oh, and then you stir in linguini. Yeah. And I just don't want to share long noodles ever. You don't want to share long noodles. Not even with a love a romantic interest.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. No, I don't want to share long noodles with them either. Yeah, that's that sounds great. I've never put zucchini in it. I make that like all the time in the summer, but um, you just grade in like raw zucchini.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, it's grated and you know, as long as there's enough salt in there, so it kind of takes away that raw edge and gives a saucy quality, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, oh that's a good addition. And it's one of those dishes that does really improve with time. I mean, maybe in that like the tomatoes really need that salting time to really turn into sort the sauce.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And it's also nice something like that, where I feel like if I don't eat that sort of thing for dinner very often because I'm obnoxious about like protein and stuff. But when you're on the beach or when you're outside, it's just it I it's like hydration. And oh yeah. So those juicy summer vegetables, and like, oh my god, this is just like some kind of edible smoothie or something.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I was thinking about um one thing I always am bringing because I have them around so much, is just like marinated beans, and that always ends up being like a quirk container of marinated beans that you're just like passing around with like.
SPEAKER_00Can you take me through the marinated beans? You've mentioned this a few times, and I'm very curious about it.
SPEAKER_01They are cooked. Usually I'll cook like whatever white bean I have in the pressure cooker. So they could be like small white beans or cantalinis or um great northern beans, anything along those lines. You can do it with chickpeas too. The kids aren't as quite quite as excited about chickpeas. And then I just chop up a bunch of celery, um chop up some scallions, zest a lemon or two, um, squeeze in maybe the juice of one lemon and lots of olive oil and salt and pepper. I mean it's pretty straightforward. If I have some herbs around, some parsley, some chives, some dill, kind of anything would be great in there. But at its most basic celery, scallions, lots of olive oil, salt, and lemon zest and lemon juice.
SPEAKER_00Is it enough olive oil that the beans are submerged in it? Or is it a little bit more like coated?
SPEAKER_01It's more like coated, it's more like a sort of dressing. But yeah, but they're but there's definitely enough olive oil in there that they're kind of glossy. They're not like dry. And it is it's great because it's great for picnics because it's great at room temperature. Um has flavor improves as a slightly. Flavor definitely improves and um Yeah. And it adds a little protein if you're having a bunch of like, you know, sandwiches or pasta or whatever. Um, but that's a great one to have. And it's you know, you're right, packing it into individual, like little I mean, Lord knows we all have enough Tupperware as discussed. Um, there'll be a great use for it. Just be like, oh yeah, everyone gets their own little serving.
SPEAKER_00I'm often the person who to like goes sort of above and beyond in terms of the food packing. Um and when you just like open up your cooler and like, this is for you, this is for you.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Oh yeah. That would be a great way. I bet I could convince the kids to eat different things if I was like, here's your special container. Yeah. Um that's a good idea that's a good idea.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. The other thing I love to make similar to that is like a big slab sandwich, like a facaccia slab sandwich. Yes. Where you like, you know, you like layer in whatever and then cut them into big squares, and it's like, this is for you. This is for you. And they're wrapped up in parchment. You know, it's the sort of thing that you can spend a lot of money on buying it from a sandwich shop or a bakery or something, and pretty easy to make at home.
SPEAKER_01Oh yeah, and m often much yummier. Sandwiches are so good for that, especially like again, like an Italian sandwich that really like marinates as it sits. You know, if you have like with like olive salad or jardinera or something along those lines.
SPEAKER_00What's the tuna one? Penier.
SPEAKER_01Uh Pen Bagnet. Yes, bannier, yes. Yeah, yeah. That's a delicious one that I don't make that often, but I should.
SPEAKER_00No, I don't either. There's one that I like to make where you um basically I haven't done this in a while, but you take like a butternut squash and ri cut it into like slabs. So it's sort of like uh, you know, when you make like a cauliflower steak or something. Yeah, exactly. But like, you know, three-quarters of an inch thick or so. And then marinate it in like a really citrusy, I do like the throw some like goat churchang in there or chili paste or something, and a bunch of olive oil and salt and some citrus, and then put that into you can sort of Tetris it onto a facaca, like a split facaccia. And then a bunch of like arugula and maybe some goat cheese or feta and then just seal it shut and then cut it into big wedges. It's really amazing. I bet your marinated beans would be good that way too, inside inside a sandwich.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's a great idea. I love the idea of having like a roasted I mean, I know like eggplant and peppers and stuff are sort of more classic, but like having, yeah, big hunk of butternut squash to add a little heft to like a sandwich.
SPEAKER_00That was well that was where the that's the thinking. It's like something that you can really like sink your teeth into.
SPEAKER_01You just like bake them or something, it roasts these sort of s planks of it and then you marinate it after.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, exactly, and then let it sit cooked in the marinade. And you don't have to I mean you can sort of take it to caramelized territory, but it doesn't need to be necessarily because it just absorbs so much flavor from the marinade.
SPEAKER_01Right. And there's plenty of other texture coming from other places. Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Interesting. Sounds great. It was great. Those same flavors are also really good in like a pasta salad or an orzo salad. It brings up the whole like how do you package it scenario. But I think um but those those I mean I love like an orzo salad with like roasted tomatoes and little, you know, cut-up mozzarella and oh yeah, olives. Do you ever yeah, olives? Something briny. Yeah. Do you ever make um salad dressing out of jardinero brine?
SPEAKER_00No, but I were we talking about this or was somebody else did I read this somewhere recently?
SPEAKER_01Yes, someone um uh someone wrote in a note to us and I'm trying to think about who it was.
SPEAKER_00Oh, was this Becky?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, maybe it was. She was talking about pepperoncini brine. Yes, same same concept, which also same thing makes a delicious salad dressing. Um but yeah, if you just like use that as sort of the vinegar component and add, you know, olive oil basically and some it's fun to add like some fennel extra fennel seeds and some, you know, um maybe some like herbs if you feel like it, but just having that like bright, briny, little bit spicy flavor that really then coats everything is is a real treat for like pasta or orzo or maybe.
SPEAKER_00Totally.
SPEAKER_01I love that. Yeah. Well it's yeah, great in marinades and stuff too, obviously. But I'm also yeah, like a sun-dried tomato. I feel like sun-dried tomatoes get such a weird rap these days, but I'm they're making a comeback.
SPEAKER_00All the 90s stuff is coming back.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's true. Hideous genes.
SPEAKER_00You know that that marry me chicken. Oh, right, yes. That's like that is blown up in the past, it's probably like five years now.
SPEAKER_01But um, I know, and the extensions of it have gotten almost absurd. Where it's like Mary May Brussels sprouts, and I'm like, hmm. I don't know. I don't think so. I don't think anybody's gonna accept a wedding proposal on basis.
SPEAKER_00Um so when I think of picnics, my mind still goes to like COVID times of when the only way you'd ever get to socialize is going out to some frigid park and sitting on a blanket and then like pretending that you're enjoying yourself.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_00Um so I I think my just as a survival tactic or something, I'm going to the beach. But the other thing I like to bring to the beach is um cold soups. Do you ever do that? Make like a gazpacho or one of those cold um cucumber soups. There's that's so nice. Well so hydrating. It's all the hydr- yeah, I th I that's what it is. It's like in the heat. I just I'm thinking like, what are all the fun ways that we can stay hydrated while we're outside?
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And I bet like given all those, I don't know how you package it, but given all those like um I don't know if you guys have like a plethora of those um those like vacuum bottles that keep things cold. Oh yeah, the thermoses. Yeah, like a thermos, it would be so easy to like put something in there and be like, and it will stay cold. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I'm putting them in the little deli containers. Oh, which everybody has a little stack of deli containers when they come to the beach with me. You don't even need a spoon or anything, you just kind of drink it.
SPEAKER_01If like the kids and I are going on some little excursion or whatever, I'm like usually packing lunch for us. Sometimes we'll just like if we've got like nothing else to do and the kids don't have school, we'll go take the ferry like a few stops and then make our way home. It's like kill some time. Um, but it was really fun. Recently we made some summer rolls and um that was a really fun thing to bring. Um because it felt really like like different and exciting. It wasn't just like a sandwich, and it was fun to have like a little thing of sauce and stuff. It was in retrospect like a little complicated to it's the only thing I always forget about the ferry is that it's actually like incredibly fast. So you think you're gonna like really have like some leisure time and we're all like, oh, we're gonna have this delightful lunch on the roof of the ferry, and then I'm like, we've got 10 minutes. As we're like barreling down the East River. But that was actually that was a really, a really fun one.
SPEAKER_00That's a great idea.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00I'm remembering too, I maybe one of the reasons, sorry to go back to my comment about COVID and picnics, is that Vincent and I got married in 2020 and we had a wedding party months later in uh Prospect Park, which is like the big park in in Brooklyn. Um, and I made all these little snack boxes, and it was still the time when everybody brought their own blanket and spaced them out six feet, and I wanted there to be food and something, and so I was like, how do we do this without you know getting worried about having to make close contact or like sharing food or anything? So everybody got I made a snack box for them with a little two little dips and a little piece of my focaccia, and then there's a little salad and then a little dessert and um That's so special. And it was really nice actually, yeah. And that's you know, obviously that draws on my uh
SPEAKER_01Proclivity for packaging food in the such a like special little thing. And also, yeah, to like come and celebrate and feel like you're all sharing an experience, even if you're not like all sharing the same spoon, luckily.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. That's really cool.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's kind of a that is like a pretty standout picnic. You know, when you get like a little dressing on the side, if you do take out like it was a bunch of these little maybe they're bigger than that, but small containers like that, and we spent a whole day like with our little plastic gloves on and our masks, like diving up I made this like feta walnut dip and a little mushroom pate and like scooping them into the containers. Oh, that's so sweet. Wrapping up the the bread in a little parchment square and stuff.
SPEAKER_01That's so sweet. Gosh.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it was fun.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. That's really how many people was it? I'm gonna say it must have been like eighty or something.
SPEAKER_00It was pretty big for well, maybe it wasn't maybe it was more like fifty or sixty. It's so funny looking back on that now, it just feels like my brain I I don't know. I couldn't even tell you I know now, obviously it was like six years ago, but it doesn't it could be two, it could be twelve, it could be total uh cloud of yeah, of time warp. Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_01Oh, that's really sweet. Uh yeah, in general, I don't feel like picnics are my strong suit, but if you lean into it a little bit more, you can make it kind of fun. Um like using those vacuum, those what are they called again? Yeah, thermoses. Using those thermoses for all sorts of stuff. Like, like you can put like wine in those. Oh yeah. Like, I mean, I guess this isn't like a news flash to anybody, but like it's great to like put some rose in one of those and be like, it's just cold. Or having a variety of dips is also always like a treat. Whether you go in like a sort of Middle Eastern, that's usually sort of the vibe I go in. Like some hummus and some Mahamara and some baba ganoosh, and you can bring like veggies to dip in them or pita chips or that kind of thing.
SPEAKER_00Finger food. Finger food.
SPEAKER_01It's like snacks for dinner, it's your book, basically. Like Tom and I spent a lot of time in London before we had kids, and we used to have these picnics. When I look back at pictures, I'm like, I can tell I did not have children then, like just by the spread that I've made, where it's literally like, you know, the delicious cheeses and the little, you know, thing of fig jam and the baguette and the you know, and then salamis, and then I'm like, and smoked salmon, and this, and fresh fruit. And you're just like, this is there are two people here. This is totally absurd. But it's so fun to go over the top. But bringing all that stuff and like really getting to spread it all out and like having the like joy be the like nibbling of it. Like, I think that's part of the fun of like a picnic is sometimes is that like you don't actually like sit down and necessarily like have a meal. It could be much more like you spread all this stuff out and you just sort of see what happens after a few hours.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, you just graze. Yeah. And then every once in a while somebody's like, um, is anybody eating this anymore? I just want to get it out of the sun. Exactly.
SPEAKER_01That's me, I know. Or like the bees come and then you're like, this is gotta pack all this up. But that's such a like luxurious time to get to spend with people where you just get to be like, all our needs are kind of taken care of, and you just get to like sit around and like play some bananograms or you know, like have a sort of unscheduled moment. I think it's very pleasant.
SPEAKER_00And I also find when you're outside, if you're at a picnic or if you're at the beach or you're camping or on a road trip or whatever, everything just kind of tastes better. You know, like the the store-bought, the grocery store's hummus, uh which I mean I I eat all the time anyway, but like somehow it tastes delicious when you're sitting there on the beach. The tostitos like scoops, chip like the chips that I wouldn't necessarily like serve if I was having people over for dinner. Yeah. Those are so great out on a picnic, like the jarred salsa that I also wouldn't put out necessarily if I would even have dinner party at home or even like eat it at home. But somehow when I'm sitting out on a blanket in the park or something, it's just delicious and fun. It makes me think of like when I one when I was a Boy Scout very, very briefly growing up, and my dad and I went on a um like a backpacking outing, and I had never been an um an oatmeal person before, but out in the middle of the Idaho wilderness when there wasn't really anything else to eat for breakfast. But instant oatmeal was such a revelation. I was like, God, this is delicious. I'd and I would never have eaten oatmeal if I was, you know, at home. And now obviously oatmeal is a huge part of my life.
SPEAKER_01Well, yeah, that was really the beginning of like a whole new world for you. Oh man, well, what are you making for dinner tonight?
SPEAKER_00Oh, I knew you were gonna ask that.
SPEAKER_01I know as I'm saying it, I'm like, what am I making for dinner tonight?
SPEAKER_00I was just I was telling you before we started recording. I'm I have like these two sort of big deadlines coming up and so much cooking to do before them that it's like it's a little bit overwhelming, and I haven't done the thing yet where I I usually this always happens. I get to this stage where I can feel like my heartbeat rising, and like I need to get a grip on this, and I need to get a and all I need to do is just like sit down, map it all out, make a plan. But I haven't done that yet.
SPEAKER_01And um pre pre-plan is very stressful. Yes.
SPEAKER_00Um one thing that I have been playing around with this week that's been really fun and good is um do you ever like eat tofu without like not the silken tofu, but like a firm tofu where you just boil it and then marinate it or throw some vegetables on there or something. Have you done that?
SPEAKER_01I haven't, but I've been reading about it lately and I'm kind of curious because I guess it kind of tightens it up a little bit. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00It's well perfectly. Yeah. There's a science term for it. Yeah. But um, it does something like that. That's what I was thinking. That was the word I was thinking, but I'm like, that's I'm not even gonna say it because it's probably so far off. That is the word that I was thinking.
SPEAKER_01Not a science podcast. Yeah, this is not a science.
SPEAKER_00Do not come to us for that kind of information. Um but it does, it changes the texture and it makes it like kind of bouncy. Well, it's not firm, but it's just like no longer is crumbly. Interesting. And it's really good. And I did this last night where I like blanched the tofu in salt water along with a bunch of other, and I sort of like stood there and blanched a few different vegetables and then put them together and drizzled a dressing over the top, and it was all and then shocked them so that it was cold. Um and then drizzled a dressing on top. It was really good, and it felt like a really nice, like fresh, springy, summery type of thing to eat. So I might do something like that tonight for dinner.
SPEAKER_01That sounds great. Well, especially if um also sounds so easy if it's like a one pot of boiling water and you're just like spidering stuff in and out.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_01Make a yummy sauce.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's kind of that's the vision.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Huh. Did you have any like noodles or rice or anything?
SPEAKER_00Just kind of um I didn't. Just because I had so many different vegetables, it was um yeah, it was good. What are what are you thinking?
SPEAKER_01Uh we have some leftovers. I made some salmon last night.
SPEAKER_00Oh, how do you cook it in like in the oven?
SPEAKER_01I broiled it last time. And that was pretty good. It was like normally I just buy frozen salmon from Costco, and we didn't have any of that, so I went to the supermarket and got some. And um, so it was like a much bigger um heftier piece. I feel like the wild stuff, the wild sake salmon I get at Costco is like these really thin pieces. So this was like a big chunky piece of salmon, which was very exciting, like really fatty. But yeah, I broiled it on one side, on the not skin side, and then flipped it over, and actually, you know, in the sort of half cook, the then the skin just came off and I lay it right next to it so it could sort of broil on its own. And then to cook the other side. It I mean, I was really winging it, but it actually ended up being kind of a good technique because the I mean I like salmon pretty medium rare, but I do find that to be a little difficult when you have like a really big chunky piece. So it was good to sort of give the underside of the skin a little heat. Um, but then the literally the salmon skin, because I just laid it there and it had like you know salt on it and it got really broiled, it it literally was the best salmon skin I've ever had. It was just like crispy as a you could have like tiled a roof with it. It was like it like had so much integrity, sort of physical integrity. It was amazing. Wow. Um so yeah, the broiler.
SPEAKER_00That's I mean, I always broil fish just because in an apartment.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00I don't want I don't like do it on the stovetop because it makes madness. And somehow the broiling, I don't know, it controls the smell as well.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it does seem to.
SPEAKER_00Maybe it does it seems to. But um, what I always do is skin side up first under the broiler. Yes. And then I'll check to see how done it is, and maybe I'll just flip it over and then do a minute to finish cooking it. You do, when you flip it over, have um you lose some of the crispiness of the skin.
SPEAKER_01That's what I really didn't want to lose because I was like, if I'm gonna eat the skin, it does have to be like wildly crispy or else I'm not really that into it. So yeah, it's kind of an experiment. But it was it was pretty yummy. Um so there's a little piece of that left, so we maybe we'll just have leftovers. I mean we have some leftover um sausage and broccoli rob pasta that the kids like. We got this new uh shape. I took Henry to the grocery store and they had um I think it's called Cresto de Gallo. It's like a rooster's crest shape. Oh, which he picked out, which are really fun, I have to say. It's like, you know, it sort of looks like a giant macaroni that has like some ruffles kind of on it. So it's anyway, they're really perky. So um, so yeah, maybe just leftovers, maybe clear out the you can't let cooked salmon sit around, really. Maybe I'll make some sort of special gochu jang sauce or something, drizzle it over, be yummy.
SPEAKER_00Yum.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so that's the plan now that we've talked it through. Yeah, now we have a dinner plan. Yeah, yeah. Well, um well, great. Well, we'll let's just talk soon.
SPEAKER_00Sounds good. Have a good dinner eat.
SPEAKER_01Thank you, you too. Good luck for the work. Ah, thanks. Okay, bye.
