Winter Melon Soup

Soup common to the Chinese in Hawaii and I suppose all over Asia. Can be made with pork, beef, chicken, or anything for a soup base. This one I made with dried scallops.

Softened the dried scallops then broke apart and added to water in a crockpot. Added sliced water chestnuts, sliced bamboo shoots and sliced shiitake. Cooked quite a while and added chunked winter melon for the last hour or so.

Pasta Puttanesca

A quick pasta dish with a sauce made from anchovies, capers, garlic and bottled spaghetti or marinara sauce.

I slowly fry a tin of anchovies packed in olive oil (chopped) in the oil plus a little more along with chopped round onion until the anchovies practically melt. Then add some chopped garlic and then the spaghetti sauce and some red chili pepper flakes, eventually some capers. Serve it over pasta, this time angel hair pasta.

This is the quick easy way, as you can also make it with canned tomatoes or ripe fresh tomatoes and the usual ingredients to make a tomato sauce. Many, many different recipes for it. The lore of the origin of puttanesca sauce is interesting - also known as "Whore's Spaghetti"!

But like it quick and easy while being still tasty! Only "red" pasta I eat now. Sometimes I add canned chopped clams.

My favorite pastas are still "plain" clam linguine, made from olive oil, garlic, parsley and clams (canned or fresh in shells); and shrimp scampi linguine from butter, olive oil, garlic, parsley and shrimp!

Pork Watercress Soup

Just a simple soup from cooking pork slices and a piece of ginger with water and a little salt in a crockpot for a long while (~4 hours on HIGH), then adding chopped watercress a bit before serving.

Can add some dried shrimp or dried scallops (soaked) at the start.

Was planning on adding sliced shiitake but forgot.

Koregusu

My chili pepper plants here. Think I'm going to have to move them inside as they're getting beaten up the 50s temperatures and wind.

Small, very similar to Hawaiian chili peppers. Very HOT!

Rotisserie Chicken Jook

Crockpot of jook made with bones from a rotisserie chicken. Also has sliced shiitake mushrooms, foo jook and water chestnuts. Way my mother makes jook, full of goodies. Will eat with green onions, pidan and shoyu.

Home Lunch Bento

My lunch bento of beer/miso/shoyu chicken, corn and rice.
Simple but so ono!

Beautiful day in Okinawa!

Happy New Year from Okinawa.

Beautiful day - 73 degrees and sunny. So much like a day in Hawaii. This the view from my balcony towards the Jusco shopping center in Mihama. A packed parking lot!

Soki Nitsuke

SOKI NITSUKE

Braised baby back ribs nitsuke-style.
My New Year's dinner. Oishii!

Thanks to recipe from K&S.