Home-cooking

Since I got sober, I've been doing quite a bit of home-cooking. Besides it being a good way to occupy my time planning and preparing, it is also a great way to try and eat healthy. I like the fresh veggies and meat and, if sauce be required by the recipe, I can play around and modify the way I want the dishes to taste.

So far, besides the typical casseroles, I've been playing around with baking salmon, frying salmon and the various marinades that go with fish, experimenting with the side-dishes, like balsamic honey glazed brussels sprouts, buttered pesto penne.

I've also been stir frying. The hoisin chicken stir fry was a bit too sweet for my taste so I won't be making that again. Tonight, to put the remaining hoisin sauce along with other sauce ingredients to good use I made kung pao shrimp which turned out really well.

I made slight modifications to the way I did the kung pao shrimp recipe below, like using pre-cooked shrimp to keep the vegetables a bit more el dente than the suggested cooking time and I used crushed cayenne pepper to heat up the spicy dish a bit more and I garnished the dish with green onions (the way I have seen it served in restaurants).

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Kung Pao Shrimp
INGREDIENTS
For the stir fry:
·      1 tablespoon vegetable oil
·      1 pound large shrimp peeled and deveined
·      1 red bell pepper cut into 1 inch pieces
·      1 green bell pepper cut into 1 inch pieces
·      1/2 cup yellow onion cut into 1/2 inch pieces
·      1 teaspoon minced garlic
·      4-6 dried red chillies
·      1/2 cup roasted unsalted peanuts
·      salt and pepper to taste
For the sauce:
·      2 tablespoons soy sauce
·      1 tablespoon hoisin sauce
·      2 teaspoons sesame oil
·      2 teaspoons sugar
·      2 teaspoons cornstarch
·      2 tablespoons water

      INSTRUCTIONS
Heat the oil in a large pan over high heat. Add the onion and cook for 2-3 minutes or until just softened. Add the red and green bell pepper and cook for 3-4 minutes or until tender. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Add the garlic and cook for 30 seconds.

     Add the shrimp to the pan and cook for 3-4 minutes, or until shrimp are pink and opaque. Add the chilies and peanuts to the pan.

     While the shrimp and vegetables are cooking, make the sauce. Whisk together all of the sauce ingredients in a small bowl.

     Add the sauce to the shrimp mixture and bring to a boil; cook for 30 seconds to 1 minute, or until sauce is just thickened.

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Before too long I'm liable to become chubby if I'm not careful and get lazy about my self-promised daily walks.