Saturday, December 01, 2018

Imitating Oysters...Really



As you long-term readers know I am infatuated with egg foo young made in another point in time. Seriously, if I could time travel I would go back to the late 50s early 60s in order up egg foo young from the House Of Louie in Boise Idaho. Not unlike the owner of the diner in the even kings November 22nd 1963,the diner owner goes back in time and buys hamburger at 1963 prices to sell back in the present day.

So you know I like to cook. Every so often I tried to build an egg foo young like I used to enjoy but I've never been able to quite get it right. I also like to cook or try to cook other Asian dishes. I think I'm a little intimidated at part of the process are utilizing Asian ingredients which probably makes all the difference in the world. I've have a bottle of oyster sauce which I think I've had for at least 10 years and I've never cracked the seal. I'm just worried that if I try to use this oyster sauce I'll mess up the whole dish and have to throw the whole thing out. I'm kind of toying with the idea of trying to cook some pepper beef chow mein. Of course everything with an Asian dish, in my estimation, is the sauce or gravy. I've done gravy before and it's okay just not the same. My gravy I make from scratch leaves a bit to be desired. I thought about actually just getting the Canon of beef gravy or chicken if that's the protein I'm using and adding ingredients I want onions, bell peppers, mushrooms, carrots and even peas if I can find a box of frozen peas somewhere. I think this all make fine gravy but should I opened the bottle of oyster sauce and add a few drops might make all the difference. Mind you I think it's hilarious that what I'm using is actually imitation oyster sauce. I'm not sure what that really means but I assume no oysters were harmed for the production of this bottle of flavoring. So the bottle is full of imitation product so no one or how long I've had the product in the sealed form I should be okay to use it. To that end I'm going to try to use one of my steaks I've gotten from the food bank and mix all the ingredients together to make by pepper steak rendering and then all I need is the noodles.

One of the items I got in the divorce was a cardboard box full of Ramen noodles which is at least 15 years old. We bought a case of Ramen when Brooks was an adolescent and lived with us. He went through a period like most adolescents his age of living off Ramen noodles. You'll need a few of the noodles the rest went into this box which resided in our food closet which somehow followed me over to where I'm living now. I haven't used too much of the noodles but I did yesterday and I was pleasantly surprised that there were still edible. So I've been thinking if I make the green pepper or broccoli sauce and have it available for when I make my noodles might be able just add the whole thing together and make a great little dish. I don't know how realistic it is not might be a fun thing to do on a Sunday afternoon when snow is threatened in the clouds hang low and there's no way for me to go back to 1963 for and for young from the House of Louie.


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