Food Truck Friday - Tacos El Tajin

I'd always been intimidated by the long lines that grow at Tacos El Tajin starting very early. But what I never observed was just how quickly that line moves. As I learned on my first visit there this week, they are a well oiled machine!







One person takes orders and relays them to the people cooking from the first window at the back of the truck. Orders are called out as they are ready from a second window, midway down the truck. Then a third guy, standing curbside next to a condiment table, focuses only on payments. The whole thing went so smoothly that before I made it to pay, I had my tacos in hand. It looked like more complex orders might take a bit longer, but I didn't see anyone waiting long.







Their menu is also designed for speed, with their 10 menu items numbered and with clear pricing right where you need them and big enough (and not in someone's handwriting) so that it's easily read. There are five meat choices (Asada - Steak, Pollo - Chicken, Al Pastor - Spice Pork, Carnitas - Refried Pork, Lengua - Tongue), all with English translations. Sides are available to customize your choice, but also kept to a short list: rice, beans, avocado, cheese and extra meat. Only the drink menu is somewhat long. I figured I'd start at the top, and go for the #1: 4 tacos for $5 special.







I went with my taco truck standby, the lengua (tongue) as my first taco choice, on two tacos. I decided two meats would be the best option, so I'd be sure I knew which was which. 4 different meats can get a little confusing, I've learned. The lengua was tender and flavorful, and the start of the tacos, with just cilantro, onion and lime wedges to accompany them in the small double-corn tortillas. Of course, I couldn't resist the super-hot sauce (in the yellow bottle), plus some tomatillo salsa and crema. Even with a little crema, I was feeling the heat for awhile after eating.







I also went for Chicken tacos, which were on the dry side, so I'll probably stick with lengua or try the pork options in the future. I'll be heading back soon to try a torta, most likely... or maybe just more delicious and quick tacos.

Our First Experience with Shirataki

Tonight, Dan planned another recipe from the Men's Health cookbookhe discovered early this year. It featured an ingredient I'd never heard of, let alone used, so I thought it was worth a post - particularly with so many people doing paleo and gluten-free diets these days.



The recipe is a simple noodle & veggie stir-fry, but it uses tofu shirataki - a noodle made of soy beans and yam flour. Packaged in water, the noodles require no boiling, making dinner come together all the more quickly. You just rinse them and let them sit in hot water until you're ready to use them. They come in a couple shapes (the ramen-like noodles we used, plus fettuccine style), and AmazonFresh carries both. I'm not sure how versatile they are (e.g. can they be baked in a casserole?), but the flavor and texture were good, so I'd definitely try them out again.



Black Bean, Vegetable and Noodle Stir-Fry
2 tspn olive oil
1 red bell pepper, chopped
1 green bell pepper, chopped
1 small onion, chopped
1 small zucchini, halved and cut into chunks
2 cloves garlic, minced
16 oz shirataki noodles, drained and rinsed in hot water
1 15-16oz can of black beans, drained and rinsed
2 Tbspn soy sauce
1 1/2 tspn sodium-free seasoning mix
2 Tbspn fresh cilantro, chopped
Hot sauce

In a wok or large skillet over high heat, warm the oil. Add the peppers, onion, zucchini and garlic. Reduce the heat to medium-high and cook, stirring frequently, for 4 minutes or until vegetables start to soften.



Add the noodles, beans, soy sauce (we used gluten free) and seasoning mix (we used a mix of garlic powder, onion powder, cumin, coriander, cayenne, and chili powder). Reduce the heat to medium. Cook, stirring frequently, for 3-4 minutes longer, or until the mixture is hot. Add the cilantro. Toss to mix. Serve with hot sauce.

Getting Back Into It

I've been wanting to get back into blogging a bit.  Perhaps not every single day again, but hopefully I can pull off sharing something I've made or eaten at least weekly.  There's so much to share, it's hard to know where to begin...

In the time I've been focusing on other things, Dan has become increasingly adventurous in making use of more and more of our cookbook collection when meal planning, and taking a bigger role in preparation.  Not only has he made a goal to make every recipe in the Best of the Best from Hawaiicookbook, but he's been grabbing others more frequently - and I often come home to my mis en place (or at least all the ingredients) out on the counter waiting for me.

I've also been known to 'seed' the meal planning by pulling out a cookbook I've been meaning to try.  I think tonight's recipe might've been from one of them:  Lourdes Castro's Simply Mexican- which I pulled off the shelf when looking for inspiration for a Mexican brunch a few weeks back.

This dish came together quickly and had good heat from the chipotle, balanced with the cream.  I think I'd enjoy this as a taco, though the crunch was nice.  Rumor has it we'll be making another recipe from the cookbook soon - a tuna with a corn salsa, which should make use of the corn we've been growing behind the garage.

Smothered Shrimp Tostadas

2 large or 3 medium tomatoes (about 1 lb)
2 cloves garlic, unpeele
1 canned chipotle chile
1 tspn red wine vinegar
1/2 tspn salt
1 lb shrimp (butterflied, if large)
1 Tbspn olive oil
12 flat tostada shells
1 head lettuce, finely shredded
1 cup Mexican crema (or in our case, cream cheese)
1/4 cup chopped cilantro leaves

Roast the tomatoes and garlic (both whole) in a cast iron skillet over medium-high heat for a15 minutes, or until the tomatoes are soft.  Turn the tomatoes every 4 minutes to get an even charring.  (We cut ours in half to speed things up, cuz the dog was getting impatient for his dinner.)  Don't worry if they get black - that's what you want.  Remove the tomatoes from the heat and put in your blender.  Pull out the garlic and squeeze the softened garlic out of their peels into the blender.  Add the chipotle, vinegar, and salt and blend until smooth.  (Use caution if things are still hot, as it can splatter.)

Season the shrimp with salt and pepper.  Heat the olive oil in the skillet over medium-high heat.  Add the shrimp and saute "until they are golden brown" (which seemed like overdone to me, so I just cooked until they were close to cooked through.)  Add the chipotle sauce to the pan with the shrimp and allow to simmer for 5 minutes.  This is a good time to do a little taste test of the sauce, and add salt if needed.

(If using cream cheese instead of crema, because you didn't notice those ingredients over on the other part of the page of the cookbook, put it in a saucepan over low-medium heat and stir until it's the consistency of sour cream.  Or, just use sour cream.)

Place tostadas on a plate and top each with a handful of lettuce.  Add some shrimp, along with chipotle sauce (add a little extra, for good measure).  Drizzle with crema and garnish with fresh cilantro.

One of "the Healthiest Meals on the Planet"

Dan hasn't taken much interest in my food reading in the past, though he's been amazingly supportive (and flexible) as Fast Food Nationhad me eating pescatarian, and The Omnivore's Dilemmahad me passionate about eating local and growing our own food.

Maybe it's all the food TV we've been watching, but something sparked an interest in nutrition in him, and he bought The Men's Health Big Book of Food & Nutrition! In addition to five chapters of nutrition information, the book contains nearly 200 pages of photos of specific foods, some key info about them, and a nutritional breakdown. Plus, it ends with "100 of the Healthiest Meals on the Planet".

Empowered with more ingredient-specific food knowledge than I've gleaned from years of reading food science, history and politics books, Dan's been mixing some of the recipes from this book into our weekly meal plans. Tonight, we took on Easy Roasted Salmon - a quick and simple recipe that's the oven equivalent of one-pot cooking. It turned out fresh and flavorful and was on the table quickly - even after I worked late.

Easy Roasted Salmon
4 salmon fillets (6 oz each)
1 tspn balsamic vinegar
3/4 cup plain bread crumbs
2 lemons
1/4 tspn ground black pepper
2 Tbspn fresh parsley, chopped
4 small yellow squash, halved lengthwise
1 Tbspn Parmesan cheese, grated

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Place the salmon on a broiling rack. Drizzle with the balsamic vinegar. Sprinkle 2 tablespoons of the bread crumbs over the fillets. Squeeze the juice of 1 lemon over the top. Sprinkle with half the pepper and 1 tablespoon of the parsley. Thinly slice the remaining lemon into four pieces and place a slice on top of each fillet. Lay the squash halves cut-sides up around the salmon. In a small bowl, mix the cheese with the remaining bread crumbs, pepper, and parsley. Sprinkle the crumb mixture over the squash. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes or until the salmon is opaque and teh squash is slightly tender.

Serves four. Per serving: 364.9 calories, 19.1 g fat (4 g saturated), 101.5 mg cholesterol, 124.7 mg sodium, 8.4 g carbohydrates (3.8 g sugars), 2.8 g fiber, 39.2 g protein.

Smoked Salmon Fettuccine Alfredo

For a quick Monday night dinner, we cooked up some fettuccine noodles, heated a jar of Cucina Fresca alfredo sauce and added chopped smoked salmon to it. As a side, we tossed a salad mix with a chopped heirloom tomato, sunflower seeds, bacos, and a vinaigrette made of lemon juice, white balsamic, and olive oil.

Shrimp Fried Rice

Thanks to my migraines, dinners this week ended up shuffled a bit, with me using ingredients differently than planned to keep things easy. Last night's pan roasted chicken with spinach pasta sauce was supposed to be chicken picatta, and the spaghetti & marinara were supposed to be for shrimp pasta tonight. So tonight I instead used leftover rice from last weekend, and veggies from the crisper, to make a shrimp fried rice, instead.

I started with garlic & ginger in some peanut oil in the wok, then once they got fragrant, added some sliced carrots. Once they'd cooked a minute or so, I added chopped red bell pepper. Next, the rice went in, along with a mix of oyster sauce, soy sauce, sesame oil and Sriracha hot sauce. I let that cook up for awhile, then realized there was nothing green in the mix - so I grabbed some frozen peas and dumped them in. Once it was all heated through, I poured the rice mixture into a bowl. Then I tossed the shrimp with a little more sauce into the hot wok, and cooked them through. Quick, easy, and tasty. Perfect when it feels like something's trying to bore it's way out of our skull.

Pan Roasted Chicken w/ Spinach Spaghetti

Friday Night Frozen Pizza

Tonight we got started on food prep for Jennifer's birthday party at our house tomorrow evening - so a quick and easy dinner was perfect. Dan picked up some Italian sausage, and I sliced it thin and topped a frozen pizza with it.

Red Curry Chicken

I was reminded as I pulled Quick & Easy Thai Cuisine: Lemon Grass Cookbook of the shelf and flipped to the Red Curry Chicken recipe, that the reason I like this cookbook so much is the simple recipes paired with lots of step-by-step photos... and it struck me that maybe I should aim to do more of the same here. Tonight I took it slow and snapped photos each step of the way, and will do my best to do this more in the future.



Red Curry Chicken
14 oz can of coconut milk
1 Tbspn red curry paste
1/4 cup fish sauce
2 Tbspn sugar
1 lb chicken, cut into 1 inch pieces
4-6 dried red chilies (optional)
5-8 kaffir lime leaves
1/4 cup fresh basil leaves



Combine half the coconut milk with curry paste in a pan over high heat.



Whisk to combine.



Add chicken, fish sauce and sugar.



Add chilies, if using. Bring to a gentle boil and cook until chicken is done.



Add remaining coconut milk and lime leaves. Heat through. Garnish with basil just before serving.

PCC Pizza

Today was my (now former) office mate Jason's last day in our team, as he's taken a new job at one of our other locations... and it was also Dan's last day with CSE, since he accepted a position as the Administrator of ChemE, and starts on Monday. So after work, I party hopped from Jason's going away 'do at Temple Billiards in Pioneer Square, over to Dan's at District Lounge in the U-District.

Afterward, Dan & I grabbed a pizza at PCC in our own neighborhood on the way home, and then curled up on the couch with some TV before bed.

Cashew-Cashew Chicken

For a quick and easy Monday night dinner (since I have to work on President's Day), I made up Cashew Chicken using the recipe we've used before from Quick and Easy Thai Cuisine

As usual, I overloaded the recipe with cashews.

The Quick & Easy series is really, really great, and lives up to it's name. The recipes use a limited number of ingredients, simple prep, and most cook in a few minutes. We've bought the Thai and Chinese versions, and both have become some of our most used cookbooks. We've also given copies of the Thai and Korean versions as gifts. I really can't recommend them enough, and if you're looking for new ideas for weeknight meals that you can throw together quickly after a long day at work, these are a great resource. In fact, I may just but another one or two now. Maybe Korean?

I also just picked up a copy of a similarly titled cookbook - Quick and Easy Chinese: 70 Everday Recipes. It's one in another series that appears to include Vietnamese and Thai, so I'm eager to give the recipes a try and maybe discover another great resource.

Ginger Beef

From Quick & Easy Enjoy Chinese Cuisine

Ginger Beef
1 lb flank steak sliced thin against the grain
2 tspn soy sauce
2 tspn cornstarch
1 tspn sugar
2 tspn rice wine
2 Tbpsn oil
8 slices ginger root
1/2 cup soup stock
1/2 tspn sugar
1/2 tspn salt

Mix meat with soy sauce, cornstarch, 1 tspn sugar, and wine. Set aside. Heat wok and add oil. Add ginger slices and fry for 1/2 minute on high heat. Add beef and cook 1 minute, or until done. Push meat up side of wok. Add soup stock, remaining sugar, and salt. Bring to a boil and allow sauce to thicken.

Kalua Pig Pizza

Michael from Foraging Seattle commented on our use of leftover Kalua Pig for nachos a couple weeks back, and reminded me how good it is on pizza. We had a frozen cheese pizza in the freezer, so we pulled it out and broke up some frozen pork on top, popped it in the oven, and enjoyed thoroughly. As he said in his comment, Kalua Pig really is "an all purpose meat".

Cobb-ish Salad

Tossing together some organic spring salad mix, croutons, hard boiled eggs, shrimp, grape tomatoes, blue cheese dressing, sunflower seeds, and Bacos made for a satisfying dinner salad.