Spanish rice

Most spanish rice is served as side dish to meat or fish dishes. I don't have time to make so many dishes, so I actually make my spanish rice filling enough to be dinner itself. My son loves this and it's also very easy to make. I improvised this off a recipe from www.elise.com

2 tablespoons olive oil (can use up to 1/4 cup)
1 onion, chopped fine
1/2 cup of green peas
1/2 cup of carrots, chopped
1 egg
1 garlic clove, minced
2 cups of medium or long-grain white rice
3 cups* chicken stock (or vegetable stock if vegetarian)
1 heaping tablespoon tomato paste
Pinch of oregano
1 teaspoon salt

optional: 1 lb sausage

*Check the instructions on the rice package for the proportions of liquid to rice. They can range from 1:1 to 2:1. If your rice calls for 2 cups of water for every cup of rice, then for this recipe, use 4 cups of stock for 2 cups of rice.

1 In a large skillet brown rice in olive oil, medium/high heat. If you're cooking with the sausage, remove casing and brown the meat now. Add onion, garlic, carrot. Cook onion rice mixture, stirring frequently, about 4 minutes, or until onions are softened.

2 In a separate sauce pan bring stock to a simmer. Add tomato sauce, oregano, and salt. Add rice and peas to broth. Bring to a simmer. Cover. Lower heat and cook 15-25 minutes, depending on the type of rice and the instructions on the rice package. Turn off heat and let sit for 5 minutes.

Kalbi Jim

You don't have to use short ribs for this. I made this dish with Costco size stew meat. It basically isn't Kalbi Jimwhen it's stew meat, but Jiang jo jim (I think that's what it is called, sorry I'm not Korean). It tastes just as good though! I know the recipe doesn't have the exact recipe, but it isn't that hard to do it by "taste" unless you pour in a cup of sugar or something.

KOREAN BRAISED SHORT RIBS (GALBI JJIM)

INGREDIENTS:
* 1-3 pounds of english cut short ribs (have the ribs cut into 3-5 inch long pieces)
* corn oil
* sesame oil (about 1-2 tablespoons)
* sweet dessert wine or vermouth (about 1/2 cup to 1 cup or to taste)…or white wine as substitute (but then you will need more sugar)
* soy sauce (about 1/2 cup to 1 cup or to taste)–about an equal amount to the wine
* black pepper (to taste)
* sugar (about a handful or two, to taste)
* several cloves garlic, chopped or minced
* two medium onions, chopped
* several carrots, chopped
* several potatoes, chopped

DIRECTIONS:
Take short ribs and cross cut them (basically make cuts into the beef so they look like “fingers”). Put in large stockpot, add water to cover, and boil. (this is the step that some cooks might cringe at, but it makes the beef more tender and boils the fat out of the beef). Boil for about 10-15 minutes.

Do NOT throw away the short rib stock.

Fetch a dutch oven. Heat. Add about 2 tablespoons corn oil. When hot, add onions and short ribs (no stock, just the short ribs). Saute until onions are golden and short ribs are browned. Add garlic.

Add wine/vermouth (I prefer sauternes, but that is my personal preference).

Add stock from the short rib stock–you will need about 3 cups.

Add the soy sauce and sugar. Then add sesame oil.

Taste the broth, it should not be TOO salty or TOO sweet, but a combination of both, with a healthy dose of sesame taste. Bring to boil.

Add potatoes and carrots (and other veggies such as brussel sprouts and turnips if you so desire).

Simmer for at least half an hour, or until potatoes and carrots are tender, and beef is tender. (You may want to simmer longer if you’d like–the longer the better) Add ground black pepper. If broth is too watery, mix a tablespoon of potato starch with about two tablespoons of water in a cup and add to the braised short ribs (while broth is still hot and on a low flame). It will thicken the broth.

Serve with rice.

Old Time Beef Stew

This is what I'm making for dinner tonight to finish the stew meat we got from Costco. It is quite easy to make and my husband actually requested it. I got it off of foodnetwork.com

2 pounds stew beef
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 cups water
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1 clove garlic, peeled
1 or 2 bay leaves
1 medium onion, sliced
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon paprika
Dash ground allspice or ground cloves
3 large carrots, sliced
3 ribs celery, chopped
2 tablespoons cornstarch

Brown meat in hot oil. Add water, Worcestershire sauce, garlic, bay leaves, onion, salt, sugar, pepper, paprika, and allspice. Cover and simmer 1 1/2 hours. Remove bay leaves and garlic clove. Add carrots and celery. Cover and cook 30 to 40 minutes longer. To thicken gravy, remove 2 cups hot liquid. Using a separate bowl, combine 1/4 cup water and cornstarch until smooth. Mix with a little hot liquid and return mixture to pot. Stir and cook until bubbly.

Miso Glazed Salmon.

Looks like more people are interested in my fast and easy recipes than my stock posts. I'll blog recipes that are simple and good here as well.

Here is one that I found lately that took less than 15 minutes to make.


1 tablespoon of sake

1/4	cup brown sugar, packed
2	tablespoons low sodium soy sauce
2	tablespoons hot water
2	tablespoons miso (soybean paste)
4 (6	ounce) salmon fillets (about 1 inch thick)
	cooking spray
1	tablespoon fresh chives, chopped

1. Preheat broiler.
2. Combine first 5 ingredients, stirring with a whisk.
3. Arrange fish in a shallow baking dish coated with cooking spray.
4. Spoon miso mixture evenly over fish.
5. Broil 10 minutes or until fish flakes easily when tested with a fork, basting twice with miso mixture.
6. Sprinkle with chives

Don't skip on the chives even if you want to. They make a big difference on the dish. The salty Miso and soy sauce can use a little lemony taste to make it more refreshing.

Kinds of stocks

When it comes to investing in stocks, there are many ways to look at them. There are numbers to look at, potential to consider, and many other factors. Here are a few classification on analyzing stocks.

1. Value -- if you want to buy value stock, you're probably going to look at things like P/E, Earnings per share, etc. The idea is that the company is going to make good profit, so it makes the stock a good value.

2. Growth -- Remember the dot com days? There are stocks out there that people were buying thinking that it has the potential to grow, regardless of what the P/E were. That's purchasing growth stock.

3. Income -- A lot of companies give out dividends for the stock holders. Some people buy stocks for the good dividends.

4. GARP - grow at reasonable price. Growth + Value + share price that is cheaper than the company is worth that is. The company has good potential to grow, but the stock price and numbers also look good. One of the most common GARP approaches is to buy stocks when the P/E ratio is lower than the rate at which earnings per share can grow in the future.

5. Quality - Growth + Value+ GARP. Basically you look at everything. And things like management competence, Return on equity. Warren Buffet follows this.


Next time : Analyzing numbers.