Goodfood Recap #26

We are back for some more Goodfood cooking adventures! Let’s check it out!

Haddock
with Fresh Chickpeas, Summer Vegetable & Mint Salad over Freekeh

Simple meals like this one always takes my heart. Its easy to put together and very straight forward in terms of dialing things back to the basic. Some carb or something like that, some easy veggies to make and then some type of meat. Its really a great time to just dial back to everyday things and eat a meal like this. We don’t eat a lot of fish but haddock does come around in these boxes fairly frequently and we almost always enjoy it a lot. This one was no exception.

Shiitake Mushroom Tempura
with Sugar Snap Peas & Snow Pea Tips Over Sushi Rice & Wafu Sauce

The way I thought about this one was a little different from how it turned out. On one hand, Sushi Rice and Wafu Sauce is a winner. However, I can’t figure out if we waited too long (which is weird since we cooked this box really quickly) but the snap peas and snow pea tips (which I ended up cooking) was a little older so cooking it actually made it very tough to eat. It is not the fault of the meal itself but of the bad timing in ingredients. To be honest, the tempura actually turned out the most disappointing. The tempura batter was a little disappointing and really thick and I wondered whether it was my issues with it since I don’t do meals with batter frequently. The batter is what made the mushrooms not so good. I actually would do this meal straight the way it is with or without wafu sauce.

Grilled Sirloin Steaks
with Lemon-Garlic Butter & Sesame Roasted Vegetables

This is a pretty interesting dish in general. The beef was really good, the spices worked well. The cauliflower and the potatoes were so easy to cook in the oven. Its a really nice and easy to sync up all the steps also making it very on point with the amount of time that they have allotted to make this meal. It does taste pretty good also. The butter works pretty well but I still like it as a simple meal with all these ingredients together.

Pork Meatballs in Thai Coconut Curry
with Kaffir, Lime & Mixed Vegetables over Jasmine Rice

Ever since we swapped over to Goodfood, we’ve actually purposefully avoided curry meals because of the previous meal subscription box experience. This meal looked so good and actually ours turned it fairly different from what it looked like but it still tastes absolutely fantastic. The meal that pleasantly surprised us for sure. The pork meatballs are delicious. The vegetable mix was awesome and the curry was just spicy and tasty enough. There’s so much to love about this one.

That’s it for this Goodfood recap!
Any of these meals that draw you in?

Goodfood Recap #25

Time for the next Goodfood recap! Its been a while that we’re doing something non-movie related. I’m sorry for it all. Fantasia Festival and work combined simply ended up ruling my life despite wanting to do other posts. Anyways, Fantasia is over and while I still have some little things left to wrap up, we’re back to normal programming!

This was last week’s box and it was a tough one to go through because of the fatigue and scheduling and overtime all combined together. Luckily I did two of the recipes and my husband helped me out with the other ones and we managed to get it done.

Let’s check it out!

Togarashi Chicken
with Blistered Shishito Peppers & Crispy Rice

If you like spicy food, this Togarashi Chicken is right up your alley. Luckily, we’ve been getting in the hang of having some delicious spicy seasonings and I was really excited to try out this recipe. I’ve never had shishito peppers but it was pretty good and it had to lovely balance of textures and flavors with the crispy rice and the chicken. I have to say that we’ve had a few meals with the crispy rice and its a great way to make it. Its fairly decent to make also so that helps. Although to be honest, I would get some normal bell pepper pieces or some sweet peppers instead since it can get a little overwhelming.

Grilled Steaks & Sherry-Mustard Sauce
with Fresh English Peas, Baby Kale & Barley

We don’t eat steak a whole lot so this is a treat. We did end up replacing the baby kale with our own homegrown kale because it wasn’t looking too nice. We don’t usually have a lot of issues with the freshness and the weather has been really hot so even our garden isn’t doing great so it was nice that we had some backup. It was kind of our fault to have waited 2 days before using it, which usually is fine. Either way, just a point and not really a complaint. However, the meal itself did turn out really well. Barley is one of those ingredients we don’t have our house so whenever we get these boxes, we learn a little more how to use it. With the flavors here and everything, it blended very well together. it was an easy meal to put together, the shortest in this box if I’m not mistaken and it worked well for the busy and crazy week that I had gone through.

General Tao Cauliflower
with Spinach Chips & Garlic Rice

Starting these next two, my husband was the one who stepped up and took over to cook because I was just swamped with everything. Lucky because especially this one, it was quite technical and I’m not great with any flour batter and fried sort of meals. However, I honestly loved this meal a lot because of the cauliflower and how it was done. Combining that with the sauce (which was the only part I made along with the spinach chips), it actually was so delicious. It worked with some delicious jasmine rice and a crispy spinach chip along with a tasty cauliflower to just have enough crunch to make it so great together. It a tie between this meal and the chicken for my fave in this box for sure.

Spice-rubbed Pork Chops
with Plum Chutney, Charred Kale & Black Rice

Last up is the spice-rubbed pork chops. Its kind of weird to think of plum chutney and I only eat black rice when my mom uses it in this special sweet congee that she makes. Suffice to say that I’m not skilled at eating it. This one was a little toss in the air to just fill up the last meal and it turned out as a pleasant surprise. I can’t say that I’d want to make it again but the plum chutney came out really great. The charred kale is good as always and keeps it healthy. Black rice has a different texture and is a bit more chewy but it also has a nice flavor. This one does come together well enough.

Overall, that is our recap of the Goodfood from 2 weeks ago!
A little behinds schedule but better late than never!
We have a new box coming in this week so things will be back on track..in probably a non-movie related way as I take a little break (after two more Fantasia reviews).

Unboxing & Recap: Miss Fresh #5

*Technically, it should be #4 but I did get a box in October but was so busy that I didn’t end up putting up a post or taking pictures of any of the meals.*

 Its been a while since I’ve posted a Miss Fresh recap. I usually do about one of these per month. Mostly when it has a meal that appeals to us. The experience so far is pretty good. I’ve had a few little things but then I’m adjusting myself to the experience and making better choices. Box #5 (aka this one) has to be one of my favorites. One of the best parts about Miss Fresh is learning all the different recipes and a lot of them are pretty multicultural. This box in particular has that perk and its probably why I loved it so much. Meals are shown in the order that I prepared them.

Miss Fresh
(Week of November 14)

Recipes

RUN DOWN CODFISH
poached in a spicy coconut sauce with orzo salad

Run Down Codfish, Spicy Cocnonut Sauce, Orzo Salad

Run Down Codfish is a Jamaican dish. I’ve never made any Jamaican and I’ve only ever eaten Jamaican food once before. I have no idea what this is supposed to taste like but this meal was so good. I personally can’t spicy food but that time that they gave was so good for the codfish that it was perfectly cooked and the spicy coconut sauce had just the right amount of heat and delicious blend with tomatoes and jalapenos and coconut milk that I just loved it. It was burning my  mouth but I just kept eating. I try to avoid gluten and raw foods but I did eat a bit of the orzo salad which they have the recipe to make the dressing as well. The coolness of the salad contrasts well with the heat from the codfish. I liked this one a lot.

CHICKEN KORMA CURRY
with Basmati Rice

Chicken Korma Curry, Basmati Rice, Green Beans

Indian food! Personally, I don’t go to eat indian food for the sheer fact that curry usually is made with yogourt and being lactose-intolerant that kind of makes it hard to enjoy an actual meal at an Indian restaurant. With that said, my husband had this entire meal to himself. He isn’t a fan of tomatos but he liked it alright. The curry definitely has a good kick and was a tiny bit spicy. I didn’t eat it but my kitchen was smelling like curry for at least twelve hours later.

MAMA YU’S WONTON NOODLE SOUP
with Broccolinis

Mama Yu’s Wonton Noodle Soup

Possibly the quickest Miss Fresh meal I’ve put together. Generally, the meals take about an hour to put together but I guess seeing as this is a Chinese dish, I was already a tad more familiar with it and had a lot more confidence with it so it took less than an hour. I love wonton noodles. Sadly, I never have time to make it anymore and I don’t eat at Montreal restaurants that serve this in fear of MSG since I’m a tad sensitive to it. This one gives you the broth and the veggies and the egg noodles and the recipe for making the wonton from scratch. They give you the wrappers. It makes 12 wontons so six per portion. Yet again, I liked it a lot. Its easy to make something like this more on the salty side but this one worked really well. It gave us the liberty of seasoning the shrimp and minced pork mixture for the wontons with pepper and I might have put just a dash too much, but it tasted really good. On top of that, the portions are really generous. One portion wontons and with the egg noodles and the broccolini was a filling meal.

CAULIFLOWER TACOS
with lime crema

Cauliflower Tacos

The last recipe was put together by my husband. He left me the pieces to compile to show. He did add in some tuna to have some protein in his version and had the lima crema. Unfortunately, no photo of that. This is the version with the lima crema but generally the same. The bottom portion is something of a makeshift coleslaw which was pretty good. The cauliflower uses indian spices which I think is what made me not like it so much. It had a weird flavor that I’m not accustomed to and didn’t quite acquire the taste of. However, it does seem to be a relatively quick recipe to put together.

Overall…one of my favorite ones to put together. The meals here are delicious, especially the first three caught our attention. What is really nice is that in the last month, it feels like they have changed the food packing style and I like it better especially placing the ice pack and cardboard at the bottom to separate the meat ingredients to the fresh ingredients. The recipe sheets always were improved and I like the design of it more. Its been rather multicultural which also is something I enjoy to try new flavors and also experiment with new spices and new ingredients that I personally wouldn’t use in my cooking. A great experience!

November is a pretty busy month so we’ll be having another box coming in soon to ease on the dinner cooking duties, plus, it looked like a nice meals for the next one as well. Probably will be up in two weeks or so!