Back to our phone conversation.
Me: "What are you making?"
Her: "Pad Thai"
Me: "From scratch?"
Her: "Yup"
Me: "REALLY?! Pad Thai from scratch is kinda hard Jules. Did you get Tamarind?"
Her: "Yup. and rice noodles. It's the Cook's Illustrated recipe. I can do it."
Me: "Good for you!"
Her: "Yeah, I'm trying to do new recipes."
There it was. Something I told my Darlings I would do last year and did not.
Clearly, it was a challenge. Well, let's say an inspiration. I've had a bit of that lately. What with finally seeing Julie & Julia last week and finally purchasing Mastering the Art of French Cooking. (But that's another post.) And now this with my Little Sister, who is the one who DOESN'T cook!
The second phone call came around 4.50 - Pacific time. She actually did a different recipe 'cause she had ground pork that needed to be used: Spicy Sichuan Noodles with Pork - it was a huge success. Everyone loved it. So I pulled out the book and we did the re-play together. While we were talking and going through the recipe, I started pulling out the ingredients. I had everything 'cept the pork and bean sprouts for the garnish (she, on the other hand, had purchased all the Asian pantry items this afternoon - but that's another post). I did, however, have some ground beef and could use thinly sliced celery, carrots and cucumber for the crunchy garnish. I'm gonna do it! It was already 5.00 here. Rather cheeky to decide to do a new recipe, right then and there, with just one hour to get it on the table.
But, I'm cheeky. So I did it. And it was Dee-lish!
Thank you Little Sister! Thank you for inspiring me to get off my tuchusz and get cookin'! I will do a new recipe a week from Cook's Illustrated AND from Mastering the Art of French Cooking. And I will try to blog about it. I will have my own version of "Julie & Julia". You see, my Sister's name is Julie. I wonder if she still has that wok?
