exodus
cinnamon buns to die for, and hot take: borscht is good
If you got a long weekend last week, I hope you enjoyed it! We went out for dinner for Jesse’s birthday with some other friends at Sushi Mori in Coquitlam. It’s really nice inside and they have a huge menu of special rolls (including a section of just veggie rolls). I really loved the Thor Dragon roll and the Spicy Sunflower roll. Their agedashi tofu is really good too; the breading is a bit different than the usual tempura breading and it stays super crunchy. I didn’t take any photos because we were too busy talking, and at several points laughing so hard my stomach hurt and some patrons were looking at us from other areas of the restaurant.
Even though it hasn’t rained much in the past week or so, it’s been feeling very November-y, with the fog and the cold weather. And the holidays are feeling a lot closer now that all the early Black Friday emails are starting to roll in (I feel like I have about four days max until my inbox is completely unusable). I’ve had to remind myself to gear up my gift knitting (instead of my usual method of doing a few rows and then putting it down to tweet about whatever show I’m watching) and start thinking about what I might want to bake. I’m hoping to get to Bulk Barn this weekend for supplies before everyone else gets the same idea and cleans the place out of brown sugar and almond flour.
At work I’ve been busy with inventory as we prepare for Black Friday/Cyber Monday (online retail hellworld). At home in the kitchen I’ve been alternating between easy meals I can make without a lot of thought (like soup or pasta), or things I can do amidst doing other things (like making bread dough or roasting veggies). I made a great kimchi fried rice on Monday with oyster mushrooms. Fried rice is quick as long as you’ve already made and chilled your rice— I usually do it the day before or take some out of the freezer if I have any.
I prefer to make fried rice in stages (in a wok, medium-high heat) so everything gets the right sear and nothing’s overdone. Scramble the eggs and cook those first and transfer to a plate, then do the same with the mushrooms and any other veggies, then do the rice and the sauce, and add everything else back into the pan once the rice is browned. The sauce depends on my mood, but the base is almost always soy sauce and sesame oil with a little gochujang or doubanjiang, and sometimes fish sauce or rice vinegar or some other type of flavouring. I skipped the vinegar this time because the juices from the kimchi add acidity. Use a lot or a little depending on how pungent you want the flavour to be. This one in particular ended up being a bit of an amalgamation between how I generally make fried rice, and Eric Kim’s kimchi fried rice from his book Korean American. I loved it with a little kewpie mayo and sriracha on top, and the gim for additional salt.
As I mentioned in last week’s newsletter, the desire for cinnamon buns had invaded my brain, and I surprisingly did actually get around to making them. This recipe which uses sourdough starter is the king— I’ve made these a couple of times now and I am always blown away by how amazing the flavour and texture is. The slight sourness to the dough takes the edge off the sweetness of the glaze and they’re just so soft and satisfying. I like these at least as much as any you get from a bakery or coffee shop.
It’s a little time-consuming, but as with most things dough-related, most of that is just waiting for it to proof and ferment. After assembling and cutting the buns, this time I kept them in the fridge overnight and baked them fresh in the morning, which was outstanding. I ate one as soon as it was glazed and cool enough to touch, and let me tell you, pulling apart a warm cinnamon bun standing up at the kitchen counter is a good way to start a tough work day. My one regret is that I forgot to add raisins to the filling— they’re not in the recipe, but both Jeff and I enjoy them, and I offer no apologies for you raisin haters out there.
Now that winter’s pretty much here, the supply of beets in my produce drawer seems to be growing. I’d been talking about borscht with someone over the weekend, so it seemed pertinent to make some. I feel this soup— filled with veggies and beautiful to behold— gets unfairly maligned. Why, when it’s one of the easiest and most cost-effective hearty soups you can make! And in my mind the dominant flavour is really the tomato, not beet (though the beet is definitely there)— at least it is the way I make it. Later in the season I’ll share my recipe, which right now is just some notes on an index card. This is so good with crusty bread and a bit of sour cream on top.
We made pizza again over the weekend, almost the same as last weekend, but the crust turned out a bit nicer this time. And with the leftovers from the can of fire-roasted tomatoes I opened for the borscht, I made pasta sauce and added some roasted eggplant and a leftover Italian veggie sausage. Sometimes the effort to use up the weird garbage hanging out in your fridge pays off, because it was really good.
Media:
The potential breaking down of Twitter is making me feel kind of forlorn (I don’t think it’ll die today but I assume there’s a limit to how long it can continue to run with less than a skeleton crew). I know a lot of people don’t like it there but I actually do. I have surrounded myself with groups of people whom I value and there’s truly no equal space on the internet for organising amid disaster, collectively screaming into the void together, and sharing our little jokes around. There are people on there who will be gone from my life if the site disappears forever and that thought is genuinely sad. Here’s hoping the apartheid nepotism man is forced to sell it at a loss to someone who might actually know what they’re doing.
Thanks for reading— if you enjoyed this newsletter, please smash that like button below, or share it with someone new! I like providing this to you for free, but it does still involve time and effort, so donations I can use towards cookbooks or future treats are much appreciated. Anyway, if you can see this, it means twitter yet lives.