Rants and Ramblings: random commentary about culture, media, politics, technology and whatnot.

minor culinary adventure

With a good many things, I tend to be a creature of habit. Take, for instance, meal planning. Rob and I have a fairly limited menu of dishes we cook fairly well, and we generally stick to those when figuring out our meals for the week. Last night, I had a little extra time, so instead of delving into the familiar, I decided to poke through allrecipes.com and see if I could find something yummy and simple to prepare.

Because I had some fresh cilantro to use up, I decided to try the Pancho Villa Baked Tilapia. I had some problems with it — the foil-packet fish wasn’t ready straight out of the oven, so, in a pinch, I put the fillets on a pan and baked it in the toaster oven for an extra 10 minutes — but overall I was fairly satisfied with it. Next time, though, I don’t think I’ll use quite so much lime.

What came out surprisingly well, though, was the Spanish Rice recipe, which, being out of rice, I made with rotini pasta and sprinkled with cilantro before serving. The dish had a nice kick to it, and I think I’ll definitely try to make it again.

(Added plus: Dari gave us a mincer and chopping board as a wedding gift, and I tend to take any opportunity I can get to use them. The mincer is perfect for chopping up small things like cilantro … and it’s actually pretty fun to use.)

Tonight, we’re having a couple friends over for dinner, games and Office-watching (that is, if there’s an episode on tonght; I haven’t checked). We’re getting takeout from Delhi Dhaba and making our own rice. And thanks to the magic of living near my office, I’m making raspberry sorbet right now, during my lunch break; I hope it’s ready by the time I have to go back to work.