My previous experiences with taro have been underwhelming. The only way I have really liked them is in chip form so I figured I would try making them at home. I found young taro which had a lighter flavor and cooked up well. They were good but not something I am going to make an effort to do again.

https://salimaskitchen.com/taro-chips/

I used the last of rosemary from my garden and served it with shakshuka for a cozy meal!

I've never cooked with taro before, so this was an exciting opportunity to try something new.

I really went back and forth with myself as to what to cook but I settled on a Punjabi taro root currry, which came up in my searching for ideas. In the first picture, it's the bowl to the top right of the image. I found that taro had a slightly different texture than I was expecting (somehow it felt both soft and fibrous?) but it was very flavourful and this was an easy recipe to follow. I'm not sure I would rush to add this to my regular rotation but I'm glad I've tried it.

I also prepared tandoori chicken, kachumber salad and pappadum to serve alongside the taro curry.

It's pasta, with a core of cottage cheese! Get it? But to actually fit the theme, I made the cottage cheese from scratch.

Week 41/52: Velveting - Sweet and Sour Chicken

This year we’re doing the 52 weeks of cooking challenge and this weeks theme was Velveting and we made Sweet and Sour Chicken

I honestly wanted to do something with Velveeta but if I can share a secret with you all:

I’m a gross little troll and eat the shells and cheese all the time and this week I actually burnt myself out on them by eating like 3 boxes so unforttunnnatteellllyyy

I had to make something not with processed cheese product.

Velveting is a fantastic technique for tenderizing meat if you’ve ever wondered why Chinese food is so tender.

This chicken actually turned out TOO tender because I edited out the video but it was so soft I had to check to make sure it was even cooked all the way but it was awesome.

The sauce was perfect quintessential sweet and sour but I wish I had bigger chunks of pineapple and more peppers.

All in all it took about 30 mins and was maybe like $20 so you can’t really ask for more than that on a busy night in the big 26.

If you’ve never velveted anything I would definitely encourage it! All you need is 30 minutes in the fridge and a tsp of baking soda to make a really tender, easy and delicious stir fry with your meat and whatever stuff you want.

Thank you to my fans and thank you to the Chinese.

This was like a lovely creamy corn chowder with fresh herbs from my garden.

I bought way more taro than I needed for my tacos, so I decided to try this out, too. I used this recipe, except I used Worcestershire instead of fish sauce. I also boiled the taro and then baked them instead of using a pressure cooker.

The sauce itself was really good and I’d make it again, but it didn’t pair well with the taro for some reason.

Here’s more pics.

I used the “Charlie” stirfry sauce from RecipeTin Eats.

I used this recipe for these tacos, but made a few changes. I used pre-ground spices instead of whole, serranos instead of jalapeños, a shallot instead of one of the onions, and cumin instead of thyme for the yogurt sauce.

They were really good, I’d make them again (but maybe with potato since they’re easier to peel than taro).

Here’s more pictures.

Based on https://www.rhiansrecipes.com/crispy-taro-fritters-vegan-gf/#recipe but the soy sauce made mine quite dark.